
Class _ i 

Book l_ 

Copyright N? 

CCKOilCIlT DEPOSffi 



DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 



DEMOCRATIC 
INDUSTRY 

A Practical Study in Social History 



BY 

JOSEPH HUSSLEIN, S.J., Ph.D. 

ASSOCIATE EDITOR OF "AMERICA," LECTURER 
FORDHAM UNIVERSITY SCHOOL OF SOCI- 
OLOGY, AUTHOR OF " THE WORLD 
PROBLEM," ETC., ETC. 




NEW YORK 

P. J- KENEDY & SONS 
1919 



HJHW 
MX 



Jmprimi ©otesat: 

JOSEPHUS H. ROCKWELL, SJ. 

Propositus Prov. Marylandice Neo-Eboracensis 

f^if)il £Db*tat: 

ARTHURUS T. SCANLAN, S.T.D. 

Censor Librorum 

Imprimatur : 

*PATRICIUS J. HAYES, D.D. 

Archiepiscopus Neo-Eboracensis 

Neo-Eboraci 

die 14, Oclobris, 1919 



CEC I I 1919 



COPYRIGHT* I 91 9 
BY P • J ' KENEDY & SONS 

PRINTED IN U • S • A 



IA536925 



CONTENTS' 

CHAPTER PAGE 

Preface vii 

I. Egyptian Labor Unions .... i 

II. Greek and Roman Trade Unions io 

III. Politics and Violence .... 18 

IV. State Paternalism and Slavery . 26 
V. From Servitude to Freedom . . 37 

VI. Recasting the World .... 47 

VII. Serfdom and the Church ... 56 

VIII. The Feudal and Manorial Systems 68 

IX. Peace Gilds 79 

X. Labor under Charlemagne and 

After 89 

XL Origin of Medieval Gilds . . . 102 

XII. Merchant Gilds 110 

XIII. A Scotch Merchant Gild . . . 125 

XIV. Economics, Religion and Charity 135 
XV. A Fifteenth Century Gild . . 146 

XVI. First Christian Trade Unions . 157 
XVII. The World's Greatest Labor 

Movement 165 

XVIII. True Industrial Democracy . . 175 

XIX. Live and Let Live 185 

XX. The Golden Rule Applied . . . 195 

XXI. Learning a Trade 206 

XXII. The First Modern Labor Class 220 

XXIII. Revaluation of the Middle Ages 237 

V 



VI CONTENTS 

XXIV. Civic Pageants and Plays . . . 248 
XXV. The Church and the People . . 260 
XXVI. Catholics and Political Democracy 270 
XXVII. Modern Catholic Gild Program 285 
XXVIII. The Great Catastrophe 294 
XXIX. Triumph of Workingmen's Co- 
operatives 311 

XXX. Modern Industrial Democracy 322 

A Catholic Social Platform . . 345 



PREFACE 

BASED upon historic facts, the present vol- 
ume is purely constructive in its nature- 
It applies the acid test of experience to 
the great social issues and closes with a definite 
program of practical social action. 

Thoughtful men are daily realizing more fully 
that the only economic bulwark to safeguard the 
domestic peace of the nations is the establishment 
of a true democracy in our industrial life. The 
task of the writer has been to show how signally 
the ancient pagan civilizations failed in this re- 
gard at the very height of their artistic achieve- 
ments and national prosperity. With the aid of 
the Church, labor rose from slavery to serfdom, 
and from serfdom to democratic industry. These 
developments are carefully traced and the causes 
which interrupted this progress explained by the 
author. Abundant documentary evidence is of- 
fered, together with frequent citations gathered 
from the most impartial and reliable sources. 

The last few centuries immediately preceding 
the World War, viewed from the standpoint of 
democratic industry, may rightly be called the 
Dark Ages, in an economic and social sense. This 

vii 



Vlll PREFACE 

statement, which might once have been received 
with incredulous astonishment, is a truism in our 
day. Within them took place the full growth and 
unhampered evolution of that unrestricted concen- 
tration of wealth which contained, as all can now 
readily perceive, the seeds of social anarchy. It 
was not necessary, then, to delay upon these other- 
wise than to show the nature and reason of their 
failure. 

The aim of society must be to promote the pub- 
lic good, and not a mere deceptive national pros- 
perity absorbed by a privileged few. The au- 
thor's main purpose, therefore, was to point out 
the ideal to be followed in a true conception of 
democratic industry. 

From another point of view the argument for 
the present volume was thus stated years ago by 
a writer in the London Month: 

11 Whilst a certain amount of negative criticism 
of Socialism and other theories cannot be dis- 
pensed with, most of our attention must be given 
to the expounding of positive doctrine. Work- 
ingmen are much more likely to be impressed by 
knowing what the Church advocates than by know- 
ing what she condemns. They will grasp all this 
the more readily and thoroughly if it is placed 
in its historic setting, if they learn something of 
what the Church lias clone in the past for society 
in general and the working class in particular." x 

1 H. Somerrille, Jan., 1913. 



PREFACE IX 

The book, it is hoped, will serve as a text in so- 
cial history as well as a volume for popular cir- 
culation. False history has been made the basis 
of false social philosophy. We must first cor- 
rect these distorted views before we can hope to 
lead the masses aright towards the attainment 
of the ideals which all true men will gladly follow. 

Of particular importance is the extensive chap- 
ter on Modern Industrial Democracy, with its 
many examples showing the nature and growth 
of the new democratic movement in industry, and 
pointing out its rightful development. 



DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 



DEMOCRATIC 
INDUSTRY 

CHAPTER I 

EGYPTIAN LABOR UNIONS 

WE can well imagine the existence of labor 
organizations centuries before the 
building of the pyramids. The nat- 
ural longing after fellowship and the advantages 
of association between members of the same class 
or craft was almost certain to have exercised its 
influence, under one form or another, unless hin- 
dered by positive restrictions. The first historic 
references to trade unionism are, however, very 
vague and shadowy. As a legalized institution 
it is believed to have taken its origin almost 
simultaneously in Egypt, Greece and Italy, some 
six or seven centuries before Christ. The three 
great leaders mentioned, respectively, as its found- 
ers in these different countries are the Egyptian 
ruler Amasis, the Greek law-giver Solon, and 
the second legendary king of Rome, Numa 
Pompilius. 

Communities of craftsmen are mentioned in the 
Old Testament. Such were " the families of them 



2 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

that wrought fine linen in the House of oaths," 
such, too, were the potters of King David, or 
one of his successors, who settled in Netaim and 
Gedera. 1 But no special reference is made to 
any developed trade organization. Yet owing to 
religious influences labor was held in far higher 
respect among the Jews of the Old Dispensation 
than among any of the other great Eastern nations 
of antiquity, whose stupendous monuments were 
erected at the cost of untold human misery, of 
blood and stripes and grinding oppression. 

In Egypt King Amasis, it is stated, considered 
the formation of legalized trade unions a necessity 
for obtaining an accurate knowledge of the number 
of his subjects and of their means of support. 
However this may be, we find that in course of 
time a systematic division of craftsmen into State 
corporations was established with a thoroughness 
unsurpassed in the imperial days of Prussia. 
Each trade had its own appointed chief or its 
head-men, whose duty it was to maintain the in- 
terests of the craft and to represent it before the 
public authorities. Laborers employed in the 
same crafts were quartered in the same sections 
of the city, or at least worked in shops located 
together along the same streets. 

The paternal interest of the Government in 
the trade of its citizens was in great part to be 
accounted for by the fact that besides a poll tax 

1 I Paralip. iv: 14, 21, 23. 



EGYPTIAN LABOR UNIONS 3 

and a house tax, the laborer was also obliged 
to pay a trade tax. These levies, it was under- 
stood, could be obtained from him only after a 
vigorous application of the collector's rod. His 
organization would therefore prove an invaluable 
aid in directing the Government in its work of 
wringing from the laborer the hard-earned product 
of his toil. Doubtless it likewise had its eco- 
nomic advantages for the worker, but they could 
hardly have been more than to save him at times 
from bonds, stripes or starvation. The stelae 
of the little town of Abydos still record for us to- 
day the names of the labor representatives of all 
the various trades that flourished along its busy 
streets millenniums ago, from the head-mason, 
Didiu, to the master-shoemaker, Kahikhonti. 

We are particularly fortunate also in possessing 
a detailed description of labor conditions in ancient 
Egypt from the hand of one of its own con- 
temporary poets. A translation of his verses was 
made into French by the famous Egyptologist G. 
Maspero, 2 whose researches are applied in the 
present article. Though depicting in striking and 
realistic language the misery of labor, the poet's 
attitude is one of cynicism rather than of profound 
human sympathy. Like all Egyptians of his class, 
from the haughty ruler to the snobbish scribe, he 
had been brought up to despise the manual worker. 
Yet the different types of artisans are made to 

2 " History of Egypt," II, pp. 98-102. 



4 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

stand out before us in his verse more vividly and 
with more minute realism of detail than even in 
the sculptures and paintings of this remarkable 
race. We behold there the metal worker, his fin- 
gers " rugged as the crocodile "; the stonecutter, 
who knows no rest until his arms drop from 
weariness, but who is cruelly bound in a cramped, 
unnatural position should he chance to " remain 
sitting at sunrise"; the barber who runs from 
street to street seeking custom, " and when he falls 
to and eats, it is without sitting down"; the ar- 
tisan, with his chisel, who labors at timber or 
metal all the day and " at night works at home by 
the lamp "; or the mason dragging huge blocks of 
stone, " ten cubits by six," who is " much and 
dreadfully exhausted," and when the work is fin- 
ished returns home, " if he has bread," only to 
find that his children have been beaten mercilessly 
in his absence. 

With barely the scantiest covering for their 
poor, wasted bodies, the workers shiver in the 
wind or swelter in the broiling sun. But their 
comrades, confined in the workshops, enjoy no 
better fate. In verses out-moderning the mod- 
erns the old Egyptian bard continues his picture 
of hopeless toil, implying in a mere allusion the 
whole hidden history of the bitter lot of woman 
beneath this galling yoke of paganism: 

The weaver within doors is worse off than a 
woman; squatting, his knees against his chest, 



EGYPTIAN LABOR UNIONS 5 

he does not breathe. 

If during the day he slackens weaving, 

he is bound fast as the lotuses of the lake; 

and it is by giving bread to the door-keeper, 

that the latter permits him to see the light. 

The dyer, his fingers reeking — 
and their smell is that of fish-spawn — 
toils, his two eyes oppressed with fatigue, 
his hand does not stop, 

and as he speeds his time in cutting out cloth, 
he has a hatred of garments. 

The shoemaker is very unfortunate; 
he moans ceaselessly, 

his health is the health of the spawning fish, 
and he gnaws the leather. 

The baker makes dough, 
subjects the loaves to the fire; 
while his head is inside the oven, 
his son holds him by the legs; 
if he slips from the hands of his son, 
he falls there into the flames. 

In vain shall we look for any understanding of 
democracy among the pagan Oriental nations. 
Least of all may we hope to find it in their con- 
ception and treatment of labor. 

Yet trade organizations were never more com- 
prehensively developed than under this govern- 
ment absolutism. On the testimony of the 
Greeks, even professional robbers had their own 
trade corporations, with duly accredited repre- 
sentatives at police headquarters. Their task was 
to " discuss the somewhat delicate questions to 



6 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

which the practice of their trade gave rise/' and 
to fix the ransom to be paid for any stolen article, 
which then was invariably returned to its owner: 
an institution equally convenient for police and 
citizens and the honest and honorable order of 
Egyptian highwaymen. 3 

We may here advert in passing to similar gilds 
of even the most disreputable occupations, that ex- 
isted among the Turks in Bagdad under the early 
Sultans. Pocket thieves and others of their kith 
paid a stipulated sum to the police for the un- 
hampered exercise of their trade on certain oc- 
casions; but wo to them if they were neverthe- 
less caught in the act ! A double penalty was then 
exacted of them. It is of further interest to know 
that they belonged to the same general gild as the 
police officials. 4 While this appeals to our sense 
of the ludicrous, it may be well to look nearer 
home. The legalizing of modern profiteering in- 
terests, we might gently hint, for instance, is an 
even worse recognition of organized robbery car- 
ried on upon a far larger scale. 

Labor organizations have just one lesson to 
learn from the Egyptian labor gilds or trade 
unions. It is the danger of undue State intru- 
sion which in modern as in ancient life is bound 

3 Ibid., p. 97. 

4 Kosta Nikoloff, " Das Handiverk und Zunftivesen in Bul- 
garien wahrend der tiirkischen Herrschaft, etc.," pp. 53, 54. 



EGYPTIAN LABOR UNIONS 7 

always to end in tyranny. It is very simple for 
labor to hand over to the State, whether capi- 
talistic or communistic, its hard-gained liberties. 
But this once accomplished — aside from a pass- 
ing crisis where liberties are surrendered for a 
time in the interest of patriotism — it will there- 
after be difficult, if not impossible, to regain them. 
Given the little finger, the State will lay hold on 
the entire body. There is a reasonable State con- 
trol and a reasonable State ownership within 
proper limits. These may be extended as far as 
the common good requires, but no further. To 
transfer to the State the entire means of produc- 
tion is for labor to place its head in the lion's 
mouth. Gracious as the lion may appear, com- 
pared with the Egyptian crocodile, the laborer is 
wise in not entrusting his head to either, but in 
securing and maintaining his own liberty. Capi- 
talism, enforced communism and general State So- 
cialism alike exclude him from a reasonable per- 
sonal ownership. 

11 Away from the servile State I " must be his 
cry. Whether the means of production, on which 
his livelihood and liberty depend, are in the hands 
of a capitalistic regime or a communistic bureau- 
cracy will matter little in the end. There is but 
one way towards freedom, popular prosperity and 
democratic industry, and that, as was pointed out 
at the very conclusion of the World War by the 



8 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

Catholic Episcopacy in America, lies in bringing 
about a social reconstruction in which the major- 
ity shall attain to a personal ownership and con- 
trol, wholly or in part, of the means of production. 
This must be our ultimate aim. 

11 The majority must somehow become owners, 
or at least in part, of the instruments of produc- 
tion,'' was the final word of the Bishops of the 
United States speaking through the Administrative 
Committee of their National War Council. 5 The 
education suggested as necessary to reach this stage 
was the establishment and management by labor 
of cooperative productive societies and copartner- 
ship arrangements. In the former the workers 
will themselves own and manage the industries, 
in the latter they are to have a substantial share 
in the corporate stock and a reasonable share in 
the management. " However slow the attain- 
ment of these ends, they will have to be reached 
before we can have a thoroughly efficient system 
of production." Here, therefore, is the moun- 
tain of vision the American Bishops pointed out, 
where alone industrial peace and social justice can 
be attained and where popular prosperity shall 
flourish for all, provided that the code of Sinai 
is not forgotten nor the charity of Christ. Labor 
must yield up its desire of a maximum wage for a 
minimum service and capital must remember that: 
11 The laborer's right to a decent livelihood is the 

5 " Social Reconstruction," Reconstruction Pamphlet No. i, 
Jan., 1919. 



EGYPTIAN LABOR UNIO.NS 9 

first moral charge upon industry," preceding all 
rights of the employer to profits, aside from the 
latter's own reasonable living. And neither may 
neglect the interests of the consumer. 



CHAPTER II 

GREEK AND ROMAN TRADE UNIONS 

MORE interesting than strictly historical 
is the description Plutarch has left us of 
the origin of the Roman labor gilds, 
which he attributes to Numa Pompilius. 1 To 
blend together by common interests the racial fac- 
tions in the newly founded city of Rome, and so 
to end the deadly party strifes between the Sa- 
bines and the Romans within the same walls, the 
politic ruler is said to have devised a plan of di- 
viding the citizens into groups according to their 
arts and crafts. 

The distinct craft gilds mentioned by this his- 
torian as founded during the reign of Numa are 
eight in number. A ninth was added into which 
were gathered all the remaining trades. Depart- 
ing somewhat from the customary interpretation 
of the Greek text, we may classify the eight Ro- 
man craft gilds as follows: I. flute players, 2. 
goldsmiths, 3. builders, 4. dyers, 5. tailors, 6. 
tanners, 7. coppersmiths, 8. potters. That all 
these trades existed in a specialized form at this 
early period, about the seventh century before our 
era, is seriously to be questioned. Other employ- 

1 Plutarch, "Numa," 17. 

10 



GREEK AND ROMAN TRADE UNIO.NS II 

ments, moreover, which probably were then of 
greater importance, are not at all mentioned. 

One thing alone is historically certain: that a 
century before Christ trade unions existed at 
Rome which in the popular mind dated back to 
time immemorial. These ancient unions were re- 
garded with special respect by the Romans so 
that they outlived the laws which proved fatal to 
other organizations. According to a method suf- 
ficiently common at a period when historic criti- 
cism was not too exacting, the origin of the labor 
gilds was naturally ascribed to the rather mythi- 
cal Numa Pompilius to whom Rome was said to 
be indebted for other important public institutions. 
For similar reasons, doubtless, the Roman labor 
organizations were attributed by Florus to Ser- 
vius Tullius, the sixth legendary King of Rome. 2 

Of the eight craft gilds enumerated by Plutarch 
three only are spoken of by various Roman his- 
torians as incorporated in the Constitution of Ser- 
vius Tullius: the builders, the coppersmiths, and 
the flute-players or horn-blowers. Whatever 
prominence may for a time have been given to 
these labor gilds, some centuries before the Chris- 
tian era, was due to their eminent usefulness to 
the Romans as a military nation. 3 The members 
of the remaining gilds not mentioned in connec- 

2 Florus, I, 6, 3. 

3 Etienne Martin Saint-Leon, " Histoire des Corporations de 
Metiers!* pp. 3-5. 



12 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

tion with these laws were evidently classed accord- 
ing to the wealth which they individually pos- 
sessed, or more probably did not possess. Such 
was the sole criterion of this Constitution. They 
soon found their place in the lowest stratum of the 
social layers and were without political significance. 
As artisans they were held in utter contempt by 
the classic pagan world. Such we find is the atti- 
tude assumed towards the craftsman throughout 
the entire range of Roman literature. " The la- 
borers are all engaged in a base occupation/' says 
Cicero, " nor can there be anything honorable to 
a freeman in a workshop." 4 

Shortly after the period to which tradition as- 
cribed the beginning of the gild system in Rome, 
Solon (born in 638 B. c.) introduced his sweep- 
ing reforms in Greece. They completely changed 
the conditions of capital and labor at Athens. 
The poor had there been ground down to such 
utter destitution and misery that they sold their 
very sons and daughters, and lastly, even their 
own bodies into slavery to the masters of bread, 
in whose hands were the keys of wealth. In this 
stress of popular despair, which threatened to 
culminate in a bloody revolution, rich and poor 
alike chose Solon for their archon. Unlimited 
power was conferred on him to introduce what- 
ever economic and constitutional reforms might be 
needed. As a consequence the law which re- 

* Cicero, " De Officiis," I, 42, 150. 



GREEK AND ROMAN TRADE UNIO.NS 1 3 

duced the laborer to slavery in lieu of the payment 
of his debt was abrogated. He was given the 
right to vote, although he could not himself be 
elected to office, and was ranked in the fourth 
class of citizens. Slight as such benefits may seem 
to us, they were regarded as a great boon in their 
day. A Greek fourth estate had thus been 
created. 

To Solon likewise is ascribed by Gaius the Ath- 
enian law, considered as the charter of subsequent 
trade unions, which permitted the organization of 
societies, provided they were not hostile to the 
State. The Roman law engraved upon the 
Twelve Tables, which granted this same privilege, 
is regarded by Gaius as only a translation of the 
Solonic legislation. Sed haec lex videtur ex lege 
Solonis translata esse. 5 

The gilds were in Rome commonly called col- 
legia, in Greece eranoi and thiasoi. Other names 
were likewise in use, but all these appellations, like 
the English equivalent, " gild," were applied to 
societies of almost every variety. While little 
is known of the statutes of the Greek labor organ- 
izations in particular, the constitutions and cus- 
toms of the gilds in general are perfectly familiar 
to us. We reproduce a description from a mono- 
graph study by H. Tompkins which comprises the 
salient characteristics of the Greek association. 

5 Gaius, Fourth Book on the Laws of the Twelve Tables. 
Digest XLVII, Tit., 22, " De Collegiis et Corporibus." 



14 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

It is not, of course, to be presumed that each of 
the details here given was to be found in every 
instance. 

Let us now consider what these companies were which are 
called by the name of eranoi and thiasoi, and of which the in- 
scriptions have revealed the number and importance. They 
were formed of members who met together to sacrifice to 
certain divinities and to celebrate their festivals in common ; 
besides this they assisted those members who fell into neces- 
sitous circumstances, and provided for their funerals. They 
were at once religious associations and friendly societies. 
Sometimes they daringly partook of a political and commercial 
character. These private corporations, recognized by the State, 
had their presiding and other officers, their priests, their funds 
supplied by the contributions of members and the liberality 
of benefactors. They assembled in their sanctuaries and made 
decrees. They were found in great numbers in the important 
cities, and especially in the maritime ones. At Rhodes, for 
example, they were the Companions of the Sun, the Sons of 
Bacchus, of Minerva Lindienne, of Jupiter Atagyrius, of 
Jupiter Soter. 6 

Although the reality was not always as idyllic 
as this picture represents it, and a statue of a god 
was usually sufficient to constitute the sanctuary, 
if we may so call their locals, yet the idea of a 
perfect Greek gild is here sufficiently expressed. 
Greater stress might, however, be placed upon 
the convivial nature of the banquets, which in the 
latter state of Greek and Roman society may al- 
most have been the principal reason for the exis- 
tence of such associations, and probably consisted 
in wild debauches and orgies. Political intrigues, 

6 H. Tompkins, " Friendly Societies of Antiquity." 



GREEK AND ROMAN TRADE UNIO.NS 1 5 

as we shall see, were frequently a prime motive. 
How closely the trade gilds approximated to the 
description here given it is difficult to say, yet 
they were doubtlessly conformed, as far as pos- 
sible, to the general gild ideal of their time. 

It is to Rome, however, that we must turn for a 
complete and systematic development of craft and 
merchant gilds. The inscriptions dealing with 
them are countless in number and amazing in 
their variety. Almost every division of trade 
seemed to possess its union. Tarruntenus Pa- 
ternus, who was Prefect of the Imperial Guard in 
179, enumerates thirty crafts which were espe- 
cially privileged by the Government. Yet he men- 
tions such trades only as were connected with mili- 
tary works. It is commonly accepted that each 
of the occupations enumerated, mensores, medici, 
etc., was represented by a union. 7 Constantine in 
337 extended special privileges to thirty-five trade 
corporations. 

It is interesting to note that a grouping similar 
to that of the Middle Ages was likewise observed 
at Rome, as in Egypt and elsewhere. The potters 
occupied the Esquiline, the silk-workers and per- 
fumers were settled in Tuscan Street, the oil-deal- 
ers and cheese-mongers had their booths in Vala- 
brum, and the silversmiths and tanners were 
located beyond the Tiber. 

7 Tarruntenus Patcrnus, " Liber Primus Militarium" Dig. 
L., 6, 7. Liebenam, " Zur Geschichte und Organisation des 
Rbmischen Vereinswesen" p. 48. 



1 6 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

As in the Middle Ages, so here also streets 
or sections of the city were often named after the 
tradesmen and merchants who displayed their 
wares in them. Thus we have Perfumers' Street, 
Harness-makers' Street, Corn-venders' Row, and 
Sandal Street. In the latter Apollo Sandaliarius, 
or Apollo of the Sandal-makers, had his shrine. 

The ancient Roman gilds were, according to 
general custom, placed under the special guard- 
ianship of some divinity. While merchants nat- 
urally turned to Mercury, the craftsmen most fre- 
quently dedicated their gilds to Minerva, the god- 
dess of the arts. Ovid in particular tells of the 
many various classes of workingmen and women 
who assisted in great throngs at the celebration of 
her feast. 8 The gilds, as we have seen, at times 
made the temples of a god their meeting places. 
Thus the merchant gild described by Livy, which 
met in the temple of Mercury, took for its feast 
the anniversary of the temple's dedication. The 
same author writes of a gild of flute-players, who 
went upon a strike because the censors forbade 
them to hold their banquets in the temple of Jupi- 
ter at Rome, as had been their custom from the 
earliest times. In great indignation they left the 
capitol in a body and betook themselves to another 
city, where they were well received. But when 
they had celebrated their feast, and were deep 
under the influence of Bacchus, oblivicus of their 

s Ovid, "Fast.," Ill, 308 ff., 819-832. 



GREEK AND ROMAN TRADE UNIONS 1 7 

cares and grievances, the citizens cast them to- 
gether into a cart and so returned them to Rome. 
There a reconciliation took place. 9 Liebenam re- 
fers to other classic authors who have different 
versions of the same story, but it serves at all 
events to illustrate existing conditions. 

Roman labor gilds were not to mark any final 
progress towards a more democratic conception 
whether of industry or politics. The reasons for 
their absolute and pitiable failure will be made 
plain in the following chapters. 

• Livy, IX, 30- 



CHAPTER III 

POLITICS AND VIOLENCE 

NEITHER during the Republic nor dur- 
ing the Empire was it ever the intention 
of the Roman law to interfere with pure 
labor unions. But unfortunately the economic 
purpose of these institutions was too frequently 
forgotten by the gildsmen themselves and their 
political influence or physical mob-power was sold 
to the most unworthy demagogues or venal 
politicians, in return for immediate bribes, profits 
or assurances. The proper use of the vote on the 
part of the laborer to effect some social measures 
is not here called into question. It is not merely 
a right, but a duty. It was the false political 
character which Roman trade unions often as- 
sumed, the excesses to which they led and the dan- 
gers which they were thought to threaten to the 
State that brought about their dissolution from 
time to time. Yet even then the intention of the 
law was manifested by the fact that the steady an- 
cient craft gilds, which had continued for cen- 
turies, were not molested. Thus the historian 
Suetonius writes of Caesar that M He destroyed all 
the gilds except those which had been founded in 

18 



POLITICS A.ND VIOLENCE 1 9 

ancient times." 1 Again of Augustus he says: 
11 He dissolved the gilds, except such as were of 
long standing and legalized." 2 

During the disturbed times and amid the hideous 
immorality of the last days of the Republic, pic- 
tured so graphically by Sallust, the gilds mingled 
largely in the intrigues of political life. Their 
services were courted, with bribes and promises 
we may presume, by every politician at election 
times. Ambitious men used them for their own 
dark purposes, and even Cicero, with all his dis- 
dain of the lower classes and the laborers, is said 
to have availed himself of their assistance. We 
can, therefore, understand the reason for such se- 
vere measures as the Lex Gabinia, which forbade 
all secret gatherings of the people, under penalty 
of death. Such laws were directed not against the 
gilds, but against political agitators and revolu- 
tionists, who cared for them only as stepping- 
stones to the acquisition of personal power. As 
W. Warde Fowler writes : 

It is curious to notice, that by the time these old gilds emerge 
into light again as clubs that could be used for political pur- 
poses, a new source of gain, and one that was really sordid, 
had been placed within the reach of the Roman plebs urbana; 
it was possible to make money by your vote in the election 
of the magistrate. In that degenerate age, when the vast ac- 
cumulation of wealth made it possible for a man to purchase 
his way to power, in spite of repeated attempts to check the 

1 Suetonius, " Caes." 42. 

2 Suetonius, " Octav." 32. 



20 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

evil by legislation, the old principle of honorable association 
was used to help the small man to make a living by choosing 
the unprincipled and often the incompetent to undertake the 
government of the empire. 3 

Most interesting is the discovery at Pompeii 
of the electioneering posters of the trade gilds. 
The wealthy and luxurious city was throbbing with 
political life on the eve of the great catastrophe, 
and the labor unions were active in every section 
to secure the election of their favorite candidates. 
Signs like the following were prominently dis- 
played near popular taverns and public places, so- 
liciting the votes of the bewildered citizens: 

The Fishermen Vote for Pompidius Rufus as Edile. 

The United Goldsmiths Want Cuspius Pansa for 

Edile. 

The latter, as other similar notices indicated, was 
the choice of gilds as varied in their interests as 
the trade unions of the jewelers, the muleteers, the 
carpenters and the worshipers of Isis. 

Casellius Marcellus is put forward for the same 
office in a notice which would appear rather amus- 
ing in our day: 

His neighbors favor Casellius Marcellus. 

That the influence, however, of this politicinn ex- 
tended beyond the circle of his immediate friends 
is evident from advertisements showing that he 

3 " Social Life at Rome in the Age of Cicero," pp. 46, 47. 



POLITICS A.ND VIOLENCE 21 

had the support of the wagoners, farmers and 
other unions. Even Venus, the protecting god- 
dess of Pompeii, is made to declare herself in favor 
of his election : 

Venus Wants Casellius for Edile ! 

Neither did the gilds fail to put forth the usual 
electioneering promises. Thus in the year 73 the 
Bakers' Union of Pompeii canvassed for C. Julius 
Polybius, because " he brings good bread." 
Probably he had promised them to secure a reduc- 
tion in the price of grain, or other similar favors. 
Particular oddities are the announcements of such 
gilds as the " Night Drinkers " and the " Sleepy- 
heads," indicating in the former case, we may pre- 
sume, the propensity of the members to carouse 
until the morning. Certain women, likewise, as 
the placards show, were carrying on a vigorous 
campaign for their political favorites. There is 
nothing new beneath the sun, as all these discov- 
eries show! A list of the various political pos- 
ters was drawn up at Paris by P. Willems in 1887. 4 

It was not, as would appear, such canvassing 
that the Roman statesmen dreaded, but rather the 
secret gatherings in which the gilds were made a 
cloak for ulterior and dangerous designs. They 
were the anarchist and I. W. W. tactics that not 
seldom led to the disruption of Roman trade 

*"Les Elections Municipales a Pompei." 



2 2 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

unions and prevented the attainment of economic 
ends. 

In the provinces especially, the Emperors exer- 
cised the greatest watchfulness. A classical illus- 
tration is that which occurs in the famous corre- 
spondence between Pliny and Trajan. The for- 
mer, writing from Nicomedia, desires to obtain 
permission for the organization of a gild of crafts- 
men to serve as a fire department for the city. He 
recommends the project favorably, and argues 
that, since only about 150 members are to be ad- 
mitted, all of them craftsmen, he will be able to 
see to it that no unlawful purposes are pursued. 5 
The Emperor, however, is not convinced. In his 
reply he states that all previous societies formed 
in that province, under whatever pretense, have 
invariably degenerated into political clubs. " Let 
us bear in mind," he says, " that this province, 
and in particular this city, have been disturbed 
by factions of just this kind." 6 Yet Trajan was 
not opposed to gilds as such, and conferred spe- 
cial privileges upon a bakers' union in Rome; nor 
were the gilds as uncommon in the provinces as a 
passage from Gaius might suggest. 

This tolerance however does not imply any 
respect shown for labor. Interest in the laborer 
for his own sake, or for the love of God whose 
image he bears, was unthinkable to the pagan 

5 Plin. Ep. ad TraL, 33. 
8 Trai. ad Plin., 34. 



POLITICS A.ND VIOLENCE 23 

mind. Paganism was never concerned about the 
life and condition of the poor. Mr. Fowler 
rightly states the situation when he says : 

The statesman, if he troubled himself about them at all, 
looked on them as a dangerous element of society, to be con- 
sidered as human beings only at election times; at all other 
times merely as animals that had to be fed in order to keep 
them from becoming an active peril. The philosopher, even 
the Stoic, whose creed was by far the most ennobling in that 
age, seems to have left the dregs of the people quite out of 
account. Though his philosophy nominally took the whole of 
mankind into its cognizance, it believed the masses to be de- 
graded and vicious and made no effort to redeem them. 7 

There was indeed little hope for labor under 
paganism. But even that glimmer of a brighter 
future was relentlessly extinguished when he 
turned from sound labor principles to espouse the 
cause of mere political demagogues. 

A cartoonist in the Seattle Post-Intelligencer 
significantly presents the labor issue. A marble 
monument, firmly based, majestically planned and 
executed with consummate skill, is pictured a9 
partly pried loose from its pedestal. At its foot 
stands a Bolshevist laborer, trying to shatter its 
base beneath the vandal blows of his huge ham- 
mer. The symbol wrought in stone is emble- 
matic of a true, constructive labor unionism. It 
represents the figure of a strong woman, nobly 
conceived by the artist, dignified, intelligent, alert, 
with a child standing at her knee. Her head is 

7 " Social Life at Rome." 



24 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

lifted upward in serious thought and earnest pur- 
pose, while her eyes are earnestly questing the 
heavens for guidance. Her right hand upholds a 
flaming torch, not the symbol of anarchy and de- 
struction but of popular enlightenment; her left 
holds, in strong and graceful poise, the massive 
oval of her protecting shield on which are re- 
corded the immediate demands, made by her for 
the safeguarding of the worker's home. Such is 
the true gild concept. 

11 Erected through years of constructive effort 
on the part of the workers and dedicated to fur- 
ther their just interests," is the legend inscribed 
on the pedestal. " After years of patient toil a 
constructive monument of the achievements of or- 
ganized labor was built, and each year finds more 
and valuable additions made to our masterpiece," 
says the Carpenter in reproducing this drawing. 
It is true that the ideal of labor unionism that it 
symbolizes is not fully realized, particularly on its 
religious side, yet in part at least it has been 
achieved. And is all this to be destroyed, ideal 
and achievement alike? " And for what?" 
Such was the question asked by the organ of the 
United Brotherhood of Carpenters and Joiners of 
America. 

Standing by with idle hands, as the artist pic- 
tures the background of his scene, is a crowd of 
worker:, men and women, whom starvation and 
despair may at any moment drive to deeds of vio- 



POLITICS AND VIOLENCE 25 

lence. But this is neither more nor less than 
part of the cunningly devised plan of unscrupulous 
labor leaders who themselves incur no losses. In 
the distance loom the black scaffoldings of incom- 
pleted structures against the dark skies. " Throw 
away your constitution and strike with your 
class! " is the cry sent up to the labor unionist by 
a blatant press, often supported out of the money 
of the anarchist rich, while the same demand comes 
in a rising treble from the red revolutionists. 

It is not through anarchy that the laborer can 
achieve his end, but by a sane progressive sys- 
tem of trade unionism that will not disregard the 
dictates of religion; by a rightful use of the ballot 
which shall assure him the legislative measures 
that can safely and surely help to bring about a 
true democracy in industry as in politics; and 
finally by a gradual education in cooperative en- 
terprises that will enable him to take an intelli- 
gent part in the ownership and management of 
the means of production on which his livelihood 
depends. So alone may we hope for peace, con- 
tentment and popular prosperity. 



CHAPTER IV 

STATE PATERNALISM AND SLAVERY 

THE special privileges which from time to 
time were conferred upon the gilds by 
successive Emperors became in turn the 
occasion of abuses. Men often joined gilds with 
which they had no trade relations, purely for the 
sake of the proffered advantages, and even be- 
came members of many gilds at the same time. 
Hence stringent regulations followed, which led 
the way to State interference to such a degree that 
life in the gilds became almost intolerable. The 
lesson of the Egyptian labor corporations was now 
to be enforced by the misery of the Roman trade 
unionists. 

Once assumed, the paternalistic attitude of the 
State was never to lessen, but constantly to in- 
crease. The complete degeneration of the la- 
borer was to be the inevitable result. In return 
for privileges and immunities, the gilds were put 
into the service of the State. They had prac- 
tically become a State institution in not a few in- 
stances and were given special legal defenders at 
court and special judges, during the reign of Alex- 

26 



STATE PATERNALISM AND SLAVERY 27 

ander Severus. Membership in many of them 
finally became compulsory by law. 

Freedom of choice no longer existed in these 
11 socialized " gilds, for men were born into them. 
They had become hereditary and there was no 
more hope of escape from them than from a Ro- 
man prison cell. Duties of every kind were im- 
posed upon the members. They were henceforth 
impressed more than ever into the service of the 
State. Most unpopular, however, were the sor- 
dida munera, or menial duties they were obliged 
to render to the public, duties which had no rela- 
tion whatever with the trades of the respective 
unions. They were to do chores of every kind 
for the State. The most oppressive imposition 
laid upon a great number of the gilds was the ob- 
ligation of providing free grain or bread for the 
plebeian population of the capital. Upon the 
gilds which were free from such service the State 
imposed high taxes in lieu of this obligation. 

The principal unions at the service of the pub- 
lic were the gilds of the shipmasters, the bakers, 
the swine-dealers and the lime-burners. The 
members drew their salaries from the State, were 
not subjected to torture when accused, and were 
later even freed from military service, as well as 
from other public and municipal duties. Strict 
property and inheritance regulations were im- 
posed in particular upon the shipmen, who were 
most necessary for victualling the Roman capital. 



2 8 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

When a shipman's family became extinct another 
was designated in its place by the prefect. 1 

Duties which in earlier days had been rendered 
by free compact had now become entirely compul- 
sory. The statute books are full of penalties for 
men who dared to shirk their portion of the work. 
Fugitives from the unions, who sought to emi- 
grate into the provinces in order to escape from 
this oppressive paternalism of the State, were re- 
turned like fugitive slaves by the provincial gov- 
ernors. 

So strict was the hereditary obligation of re- 
maining in the gild to which a citizen belonged that 
even a cleric, when found to have escaped from his 
corporation, was under a degenerate system of leg- 
islation obliged to return to it, if he had obtained 
a rank no higher than that of deacon. The spe- 
cial law to this effect was passed in the 
year 445. 2 This makes plain how the Church 
herself was shackled by the State, and how diffi- 
cult it was for her in such a decadent civilization 
to fight her brave struggle for humanity and broth- 
erhood, and to save what might still be saved. 

Most deplorable everywhere was the condition 
of the bakers' unions. The hardships which 
membership in them implied made it most desir- 
able to escape their thraldom. To render them 
less abhorrent special privileges were frequently 

1 Cod. Theod. XIII, ///., 5. 

2 Nov. Val. 15; also Cod. Theod. XIV, 3, 11. 



STATE PATERNALISM AND SLAVERY 29 

granted, such as the exemption from the sordida 
munera. The fact, however, that men were ju- 
dicially condemned to such a gild tells its own sad 
story. Moreover, according to a regulation of 
Constantius, made in the year 355, any one who 
married a baker's daughter was compelled to 
enter the gild; and a law of Honorius, in 403, for- 
bade any baker to marry a woman not belonging to 
the corporation. The penalty in the latter case 
was no less than confiscation of property and de- 
portation. 

The conditions under this form of State pa- 
ternalism may give some indication of what, in 
another way, must be expected if an entire nation 
is enslaved under a servile State. This must of 
necessity come into existence if all the means of 
production are transferred from the capitalist to 
the State, in place of that happy readjustment 
which shall make of the majority of the work- 
ers, personally, part-owners at least in industry. 
The government bureaucracy, or in other words 
the successful politicians and clever demagogues, 
would practically possess complete control over 
the persons of the citizens. Those who would find 
least favor with them would be confronted with 
the most intolerable conditions until they too sub- 
mitted to the new servitude. 

What has been said of the development of the 
system of labor gilds in pagan times, even in its 
palmiest days, must not be permitted to leave the 



30 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

impression, as we have already stated, that labor 
was ever honored save under the Christian dis- 
pensation, where the influence of the Church 
could be duly exercised; or under the ancient 
Covenant, in as far as the spirit of Jehovah was 
with the chosen people. A greater simplicity, it is 
true, prevailed in the earlier days of Greek and 
Roman paganism, before slavery had appeared in 
the vast proportions it was to assume in later cen- 
turies. This was particularly true of farm labor. 
Yet we recall the struggles which from almost 
the earliest times took place between the patri- 
cians and plebeians. 'The latter were not even 
admitted to the ancient Roman cults, until grad- 
ually, by dint of their numbers, they created trib- 
unes and, in 367 B. C, gained admission even to 
the consulship. But they were still excluded from 
the priestly colleges of pontifices and augures. 
Certain such functions remained to the last an 
exclusive privilege of the patrician class. This 
incidentally illustrates the vast difference between 
paganism and Christianity. So too the spirit of 
conquest excluded all democracy, since not the 
goods only, but the persons themselves of the con- 
quered were left at the merciless disposition of 
the victors. The knights, or equites, were later 
to become the real capitalists, from about the mid- 
dle of the second century before our era. They 
abused their political power at home to promote 



STATE PATERNALISM AND SLAVERY 3 1 

their own interests, while in Asia we are to find 
them carrying on the most usurious transactions. 

So, again, the speculators who enriched them- 
selves in the provinces bought up, in turn, the 
rich Italian lands and cultivated them with unfree 
labor. Thus the excessive accumulation of farm 
capital in the hands of a few became the curse of 
Rome. This was known as the latifundia sys- 
tem. In spite of the ancient legislation which per- 
mitted no one to possess more than 500 jugera of 
the Roman public land, modeled after the ancient 
Greek laws, the small farmers were gradually 
bought out. In opposition to this ruinous form 
of land-capitalism a land-reform movement was 
begun by Tiberius Gracchus, and carried on after 
him by his brother Gaius Sempronius Gracchus. 
Both in turn met their death in the agitation they 
aroused. 

As the last scene of this sad tragedy, we find 
the descendants of the farmers who had once cul- 
tivated the fertile neighboring lands, now reap- 
pearing as the proletariat of Rome, who must be 
kept from revolution by doles of bread and gladi- 
atorial shows. The debased rabble thus created 
were indulged to their heart's content with pag- 
eants of brutal bloodshed and the groans of dying 
men. The munificence of wealthy citizens, and 
particularly of the emperors themselves, provided 
them with the splendor of public buildings and an 



32 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

excess of civic magnificence. 3 Underneath all this 
display was rottenness and untold misery, particu- 
larly on the part of the vast slave population, who 
were left without any shadow of human rights. 

The system of slavery was a fearful clog upon 
the labor movement. Slaves were the living ma- 
chinery of Greek and Roman capitalism. Thou- 
sands of human beings were often the possession 
of one man of fortune. They were the great 
body of the producers, whose labor, if the master 
so desired, was limited by their physical endurance 
only. Their strength and talent belonged to him 
entirely. They could, above all, be replaced at 
little cost. To wear out a slave in a few years 
was a policy often practised as more profitable 
than properly to provide and care for him. With 
this system the poverty-stricken freemen and freed- 
men were compelled to compete. 

The slave population of Rome in the early 
days of the Empire is estimated at about 1,000,- 
ooo, as against only 10,000 of the upper classes, 
who formed the Roman plutocracy and alone en- 
joyed the fruit of the enslavement of the entire 
world. There was no middle class, since the free 
laborers were all sunk into abject poverty. 
There was comparatively little work for them in 
the mansions of the rich that were filled with an 
army of slaves, but there were calls for their serv- 

* GuglielflBO Ferrero, " Ancient Rome and Modern America, " 
pp. 24-29. 



STATE PATERNALISM AND SLAVERY 33 

ices from those who themselves were not able to 
purchase slave labor or were not provided with 
requisite craftsmen. 

Though the free worker did not, therefore, dis- 
appear entirely, as some imagine, yet his life was 
one of untold misery and degradation. No won- 
der then if he finally relinquished the struggle and 
degenerated into the class of " clients " who hung 
about the doors of the rich to maintain the pomp 
of the mansion, performed any menial labor and 
were treated little better than dogs, feeding on 
the bones that were thrown to them. No wonder 
if he fell still lower and descended to the level of 
the great mass of the people, the bulk of the pro- 
letariat, who lived in complete idleness and were 
supported by the State with doles of free grain, 
and later of bread and of oil. At times even 
vast sums of money were divided among them. 
Yet all this was not for any love of the people, 
such as moved the heart of Christ to multiply the 
loaves and fishes for the multitudes that had fol- 
lowed after Him, but to avert the persistent dan- 
ger of mob uprisings. They must be fed or they 
might grow restless and uneasy, and end by tear- 
ing to pieces the handful of idle rich who were rot- 
ting amid their fabulous wealth and indescribable 
luxuries, the spoil of a world laid prostrate at 
their feet. Hence the " bread and circuses," for 
the equally idle masses, the public baths where 
they might loll about, the sensuous theaters, the 



34 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

combats of gladiators and the human holocausts 
to satisfy their lust for blood. The demoraliza- 
tion which such a life produced can readily be un- 
derstood and its fearful reaction upon all classes 
of labor. 

But there are still other facts to be taken into 
account if we would fully comprehend the condi- 
tion of the free citizen who sought in some man- 
ner to retain his own self-respect by honest and 
useful labor. We must remember that the large 
capitalistic enterprises of the day were carried on 
by slaves. These, at the height of Rome's glory, 
could be purchased by the tens of thousands. 
They could be bought at the lowest prices, could 
be supported on the coarsest food, and were, ac- 
cording to Cato's rule, only to sleep and to work, 
while the lash was mercilessly plied to keep them 
from failing beneath the strain. 

Supplied with thousands of these wretched be- 
ings, who poured in wide streams through the por- 
tals of Rome with each new conquest, the wealth- 
iest of the Senators did not disdain to carry on 
great industrial enterprises of their own. u Im- 
poverished as industry in Rome ever had been 
and ever remained," writes Joseph Schings, " the 
poorer citizens nevertheless gradually succeeded 
in establishing various trades. As soon however 
as these promised to become remunerative the 
rich with their capital and slaves entered into 
competition, and mercilessly depressed the labor 



STATE PATERNALISM AND SLAVERY 35 

of the poor citizen workers." 4 The position of 
the latter was made the more unbearable by the 
fact that the slaves themselves were a part of 
the capital with which free labor was forced into 
competition. The Roman law, moreover, main- 
tained against the laborer all the injustice of mod- 
ern individualism and confirmed in every way the 
absolute power of wealth. Worst of all there 
remained for the laborer the possibility of sinking 
into slavery himself, a fate too terrible for 
thought. 

Hence, too, the utter disdain with which the 
free laborer was regarded by the haughty Roman. 
11 All gains made by hired laborers," was Cicero's 
dispassionate judgment, " are dishonorable and 
base, for what we buy of them is their labor and 
not their artistic skill. With them the very gain 
itself does but increase the slavishness of their 
work." 5 Such was the judgment of Rome and 
Greece. Such was the judgment of all the pagan 
world. It is not the purpose to enter into this 
subject in the present volume. A single quotation 
from the Father of History, Herodotus, will suf- 
fice: 

I cannot say if the Greeks have copied the Egyptians in their 
disdain for work, because I find the same contempt spread 
among the Scythians, Persians and Lydians; in a word, be- 
cause among the barbarians (i. e., all who were not Greeks) 

4 " Socialpolitische Abhandlungen" Nos. IV and V, p. 44. 
*"Di Officiis," I, 42, 150. 



$6 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

those who learn trades and even their children are regarded 
as the lowest of citizens. . . . All Greeks, especially the Lace- 
demonians, are educated in these principles. 6 

We are told that in Athens a law was actually 
proposed to reduce all artisans to slavery, 7 

6 Herodotus, II, 167. 

7 Smithsonian Report for 1912, p. 599. 



CHAPTER V 

FROM SERVITUDE TO FREEDOM 

LABOR was a badge of disgrace in the eyes 
of paganism. The laborers themselves 
were considered as nothing more than 
proletarii, " child-bearers," a term which should 
be applied only as a mark of honor under the 
Christian dispensation, but upon which the pagan 
mind impressed the meaning still implied in it to- 
day. The masses were meant only to toil and 
slave that a few might live in ease and opulence. 
Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, Xenophon and all the 
greatest moralists and thinkers of pagan antiquity 
could not rise above this standard. 

Even the merchant was not ordinarily held in 
good repute. His position indeed was far more 
favorable. He might himself probably be a slave- 
holder possessed of no inconsiderable wealth. 
Yet it is none the less true that he too was des- 
pised by the Roman patrician unless he had 
amassed a fortune. Rome, like America, knew 
how to worship success. It has been shown by 
Nitzsch that until the war with Hannibal Roman 
senators themselves carried on trade; but always 
on an extensive scale. The reason for despising 
the small merchant, according to Cicero's view, 

37 



38 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

was that he could not ply his profession without 
practising deceit. 1 The rich bankers' gilds, on the 
other hand, whether in Rome or in the provinces, 
were always held in great esteem because of the 
wealth they possessed and were thus a powerful 
and influential factor in Roman life. 

Labor however could boast of no such position. 
Its organizations evidently accomplished little to- 
wards the economic amelioration of the lot of 
the free workers. It is true that the very exist- 
ence of the labor gilds through all the centuries 
of Roman history from time immemorial is a suf- 
ficient indication that the solidarity thus produced 
could not have been void of all results. Indi- 
vidualism, however, was supreme, as it again came 
to be under the Liberalism that followed the Re- 
formation. The common good was but little re- 
garded and the individual was exposed to the 
heathen law of the survival, not indeed of the fit- 
test, but of the strongest. The protection of the 
weak was no part of pagan ethics. Usury and 
extortion could be freely practised upon him. 

The conception of democracy was not even to 
enter into the workman's dream, much less into 
his life. Industrial democracy was a star that 
never swung into his ken. 

But if paganism prevented the full efficiency of 
the gild system, yet the convivial element was 
never wanting in these societies. It was permitted 

1 Cicero, " De Officiis" I, 42, 150, 151. 



FROM SERVITUDE TO FREEDOM 39 

their members to drown their miseries in acid 
wine. Even slave gilds had their banquets, carou- 
sels and orgies. Fellowship moreover was every- 
where fostered by the gilds. Members of the 
sodalicia, or fraternities, could not even appear 
against each other in court. 2 Similar customs 
must have also prevailed in the labor unions. 

Most important was the practice which dedi- 
cated every gild to some divinity whose feast was 
celebrated with great pomp and merry-making. 
Even when this religious instinct had been lost 
to a great extent, the statues of the god or god- 
dess must still have held their station in the meet- 
ing places. Pagan religion unfortunately could 
do little to restrain the passions of men. With 
its strong appeal to man's inferior nature it often 
served rather to degrade still further rather than 
to uplift its votaries. Yet such faint glimmerings 
of truth as it retained may still at times have 
thrown a ray of hope into the dreary life of the 
laboring classes. 

At the period with which we close our review 
the elements of dissolution were at work within 
the State. It is an absurd contention, put forth 
by the historian Edward Gibbon, and other atheist 
authors, that the decline of the Roman Empire 
was due to the introduction of Christianity. Only 
the preconceived purpose, that they must write to 
disprove the divinity of the Christian religion, 

2 Mommsen, " De Collegiis et Sodaliciis Romanorum" 



40 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

could lead to such extravagant misrepresentations. 
As Hilaire Belloc rightly says : 

The material decline of the Empire is not correlative with 
nor parallel to the growth of the Catholic Church, it is the 
counterpart of that growth, and, as one of the greatest of 
modern scholars has well said, the Faith is that which Rome 
accepted in her maturity; nor is the Faith the heir of her de- 
cline, but rather the conservator of all that could be conserved. 

Already under the pagan emperors a class of 
country slaves, coloni, existed who were ascribed 
to the soil, adscriptitii. They could be sold only 
with the ground to which they belonged. Such 
was the effect of purely economic conditions that 
made such methods less expensive as the supply of 
slaves decreased and their price rose. Under the 
influence of Christianity this at once suggested 
the possibility of a more humane legislation by 
which the slaves upon all the landed estates at last 
found a home and were assured inviolable fam- 
ily ties. In the cities likewise they came to be re- 
garded, even by the civil law, as human beings. 3 
Thus a gradual emancipation was slowly being 
effected whose main humanitarian features must 
be ascribed to the Church alone. 

As Paul Allard shows, 4 the great improvement 
in the condition of the slaves which we find had 
taken place before the end of the fifth century can 

3 H. Pesch, S. J., " Liberalismus, Socialismus und christliche 
Gesellschaftsordnung," p. 646. 

4 " Les Esclaves Chretiens." 



FROM SERVITUDE TO FREEDOM 4 1 

not be accounted for by any theory of evolution. 
Similarly the beautiful teachings of some of the 
pagan philosophers were confined to mere words 
and never reduced to practice, except to a very 
limited degree, It was mainly Christianity which 
without violence gradually transformed the con- 
dition of the slave. Slavery itself w r as so com- 
pletely embodied in the social institutions of the 
time that any attempt to sweep it away at once 
would only have ended in a bloody and futile 
revolution. The task of Christianity therefore 
was to begin by ameliorating the hard lot of the 
slave. In the fourth century great and saintly men 
like St. Gregory Nazianzen, St. John Chrisostom, 
St. Gregory of Nyssa, Lactantius and others arose 
to protest against the unnatural inequality thus in- 
troduced into human conditions. Under pagan- 
ism no marriage between slaves was acknowledged 
by the Roman laws. These laws on the other 
hand were constantly improved by the successive 
Christian Emperors so as to ameliorate the con- 
dition of slavery. The apostate Julian was the 
single exception in this regard during the fourth 
century. Before the Church slave and master 
were equal in the sight of God. Slaves not only 
could receive sacred orders but were actually ele- 
vated to the episcopacy itself. A slave was lifted 
up to the very Chair of Peter, holding the highest 
office that the Church could bestow. 5 Thus by 

5 Pope Callixtus, A. D. 221. 



42 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

the influence of the Church was labor restored to 
its true dignity in the minds of men. Two hun- 
dred years after the reign of the first Christian 
Emperor the Church had practically eliminated the 
evil of slavery, which the new wave of barbarian 
paganism was again to bring back until the Church 
could overcome it a second time. 

The gradual, prudent and effective action of 
the Church in favor of the most oppressed class 
of labor and, so likewise, for the betterment of the 
conditions of the free worker and the closer ap- 
proach of that democratic ideal which was to seek 
its expression in a true Christian democracy, is 
thus outlined by Abbot Snow, O. S. B. : 

At her suggestion the Christian emperors mitigated the 
harsh dominion, took away from the masters the power of 
life and death, gave the slave redress at law and legalized 
his marriage. The Church dignified the process of manumis- 
sion by obtaining that it should take place in the Church be- 
fore the altar. This gave facility and sacredness to the act, 
and the Church assumed the protection of the men thus freed, 
to shield them against further molestation. Council after Coun- 
cil in different countries made provision in favor of slaves. 
The churches were declared to be places of refuge for ill- 
treated slaves, securing thereby a fair investigation of their 
grievances. • 

The Church constantly urged the liberation of 
slaves as a pious work. St. Melania alone, as 
the writer states, gave freedom to 8,000. Slaves 
belonging to any of the churches were never to 

6 " The Church and Labor," p. 9. 



FROM SERVITUDE TO FREEDOM 43 

pass to other masters but to freedom only. 
Meantime they were carefully protected by strict 
ecclesiastical canons, and there was little anxiety 
on their part to exchange the state of safety and 
comfort, thus assured to them and their families, 
for the uncertain struggle that would face them 
with their freedom. 7 

That the economic condition of the free worker 
was still so precarious is to be attributed solely 
to the fact that the conquest of the Gospel over 
the souls of men was far from complete. The 
plutocracy of Rome had been sunk too deep in 
luxury and hardened into unfeeling selfishness by 
centuries of merciless cruelty. It could not be en- 
tirely transformed. Yet the Church of Christ 
never failed to produce her saints and apostles 
who were a rebuke to their age, to its riches, its 
lust and its oppression. In his review of antiquity 
Huber thus briefly describes the effect of Chris- 
tianity: 

A new element of life, which at once seized upon the hearts 
of the people with wonderful strength, was given by the new 
religion to humanity, sick well-nigh unto death. A more strik- 
ing contrast cannot be imagined than that between the dom- 
inant spirit of pagan times and the principles and ideas of the 
new religion, which therefore must be looked upon as a 
stranger come to us from a higher world. At the period of 
the enormous moral decline manifested in the fall of antiquity, 
for which science knew no cure or remedy, the needed help 
was afforded mankind by a contact of the human with the 
Divine. 

7 Ibid., pp. 9 and 10. 



44 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

The new religion declared that all alike, the mighty lord 
and the despised slave, were children of God, equal in the 
realm of grace. Mankind was to be only a single family 
under one Heavenly Father. On this unity was to be founded 
the Kingdom of God, the moral dominion of a world-wide 
community of Love. With what joy the oppressed and suf- 
fering must have hailed this message, as their new Gospel! 
Mankind was to be morally transformed. The world's servi- 
tude in the thraldom of pleasure was to be exchanged for the 
dignity of a moral freedom of the will; self-seeking and op- 
pressive domination, for love and mutual helpfulness; relent- 
less and heartless exploitation, for mercy and kindness; slavery 
and degradation of human beings, for respect towards all man- 
kind ; unbridled sexual lust, for chastity and abnegation; the 
disgrace of labor for its honor. 8 

This transformation was not indeed to be ac- 
complished in a moment, nor yet in a century, 
throughout the entire world. It was never to be 
perfectly accomplished anywhere except where 
the teachings of Christ were accepted and prac- 
tised in their perfection. The human will was 
always to retain its freedom to choose evil in 
preference to good. Yet a new era in history 
had begun, a new human society had been created 
in which selfishness was to give place to love, in 
which the family and the individual were hence- 
forth to be held sacred and in which the goods 
of creation should be shared by all. " No power 
upon earth was able to stay the triumphant march 
of these ideas through the history of the world." 
It is only in proportion as the world returns to 

8 Ibid., Huber, " Der Socialismus. Riickblick auf das Alter- 
thum," 70, 71. 



FROM SERVITUDE TO FREEDOM 45 

the truth and charity of Christ that it can ever 
hope to solve the economic and social problems, 
which under different aspect and in different de- 
grees of intensity, are ever the same. Only a 
change of heart and a change of view, such as true 
Christianity alone can effect, will ever save the 
world economically and socially, no less than in a 
spiritual sense. 

From the very beginning the Church worked 
among the laborers and the slaves of the great 
pagan empire. It was the slave population that 
crowded most numerously into her Fold, the poor 
and the disinherited, though the rich who spent 
themselves for Christ, the patrician and the cen- 
turion, were not wanting. As she grew in 
strength, she still sought, as her divinely entrusted 
mission, to impress upon poor and rich alike the 
maxims of the Gospel with their great twofold 
precepts of the love of God and the love of our 
neighbor. Her task was to lessen by every means 
in her power the evils which she could not prevent, 
and to save for a new civilization whatever was 
good and noble in the old. Her mission, then as 
now, was to strike at error wherever she saw it 
affecting the faith or the morality of mankind, 
wherever she beheld endangered the supreme 
ideal of the brotherhood of man and the Father- 
hood of God. 

The seed of democracy had been sown by her 
upon the earth, the new seed of a system of gov- 



46 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

ernment, whatever its outward form, that should 
recognize the dignity of every human being as 
made to the image and likeness of God; the seed, 
too, of a system of economics, whatever its spe- 
cial aspects, that should demand an ownership not 
limited to a few nor absorbed by a communistic 
State, but personal to the workers themselves. 
The attainment of it should depend upon justice, 
thrift and ability, aided and guarded by Christian 
laws. 

Thus, by the Catholic Church, at its very be- 
ginning, were laid the foundations of Democratic 
Industry on which the world must build again to- 
day if its structure is ever to be sound and lasting. 



CHAPTER VI 

RECASTING THE WORLD 

IMPERIAL Rome, like every worldly power 
before her, like Babylonia and Assyria, like 
Egypt, Persia and Tyre, rose to the height 
of her culture and glory only to pass through a 
slow decline to a hopeless fall. Black and men- 
acing, the waves of the barbarian deluge had long 
threatened to engulf her, until at last they broke 
their bounds. Nothing remained of all her for- 
mer pride and power save a waste of desolation 
and the solitary ruins where the night owl nested 
and the lean wolf preyed. Stately mansions and 
ancient palaces were of no interest to the savage 
races that had applied the torch to their walls and 
dragged away their last surviving victims into slav- 
ery. Forest and field were the home of the new 
conquerors who cared not for the marble baths 
of Rome and her luxurious theaters. 

Of all the glorious institutions of the past the 
Church alone remained, firm and unshaken. She, 
whose words had been but feebly heeded by a sen- 
suous and decadent Roman civilization, and who 
alone might still have saved the ancient world 
from its impending ruin, now began again through 
slow centuries to educate and Christianize the 

47 



48 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

savage conquerors of the earth. Everywhere we 
behold her sending forth her fearless missionaries 
and erecting the monasteries of her monks. They 
stood in the lone wilderness as the outposts of a 
renascent Christian civilization. Except for her, 
Europe might still to-day be plunged in a savagery 
such as existed on the continent of America before 
the Cross was planted there by the hand of Colum- 
bus. With the fall of Constantinople, the last 
isle of ancient learning would then have been 
swallowed up in the barbarian deluge. All the 
culture of Rome and Greece would not merely 
have been buried amid the ruins of the ancient 
world, unknelled, uncoffined and unsung, but even 
unchronicled and unremembered forevermore. 
History itself would have ceased to be with the 
passing of the world's literature, its art and archi- 
tecture. As Professor Thomas Nixon Carver of 
Harvard University rightly says of the great work, 
economic, social and religious, of her pioneer 
monks : 

One must not be unmindful of the splendid service per- 
formed by the monks of an earlier day in preserving the 
learning of the ancient world and handing it down to the 
newer civilization of modern Europe and America. Their 
part in the civilizing of the rude barbarians of northern Eu- 
rope entitles them to the respect of all mankind. The labor- 
ing monks especially call for our admiration. The clearing 
of the land, the draining of the swamps, the preservation of 
the arts of horticulture and agriculture, and the further de- 
velopment of both, was constructive work of the very highest 
order. Moreover, it was performed at a time when construe- 



RECASTING THE WORLD 49 

tive industry was all but submerged by the general brutality 
and violence which prevailed over the whole of Europe. 1 

Thus in that new civilization labor was human- 
ized, sanctified, dignified. The concept of Chris- 
tian democracy sprang up anew with the Catholic 
Church, a democracy of labor and industry so far 
as the world was then prepared to receive it. 
Greatest of all civilizers in this early age were 
the Benedictine missionaries. Almost every prov- 
ince invaded by the barbarians was in turn in- 
vaded and conquered for Christianity and civiliza- 
tion by these heroic munks, in whom we behold 
personified the highest ideal of both labor and 
learning. More eloquent than many volumes is 
the mere mention of the great Benedictine civi- 
lizers of the modern world: 

Augustine in England; Boniface in Germany; Anschar and 
Aubert in Scandinavia; Suitbert and Willibrod in Holland; 
Amandus, Remaclus and Ursmar in Belgium; Ruppert, Em- 
meran and Virgilius in Bavaria and Austria; Adalbert and 
Anastasius in Bohemia; Pilgrim and Wolfgang in Hungary; 
Gall and Pirmin in Switzerland; Leander and Isidor in Spain; 
Bruno in Prussia and Benno among the Slavs, and finally Law- 
rence Kalffon and Rudolph in Iceland are all names of great 
Benedictines who must be regarded as the first to lead the 
nations from the darkness of paganism to the light of the 
Christian faith and to the blessings of a civilized life. It is 
estimated that in France alone about three-eighths of the towns 
owe their existence to the work of the Benedictine monks. 2 

1 " The Foundations of National Prosperity," by Richard T. 
Ely, Ralph H. Hess, Charles K. Leith and Thomas Nixon Car- 
ver, p. 306. 

2 Dom Maternus Spitz, O. S. B., " The Order of St. Benedict 
and the Foreign Missions," Catholic Missions, Dec, 1917. 



50 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

If therefore we behold the earth emerging again 
from its deluge of barbarism it is due to these 
men of God and their fellows in the Faith. At 
the first view of the resurgent world we see man- 
kind groping about once more in the most primi- 
tive stages of material development. Slavery had 
naturally again been introduced by the barbarian. 
For a second time the Church became a mighty 
factor in bringing about its gradual disappear- 
ance. Her first act indeed was to stay the bloody 
hand of savage violence. As Agnes Wergeland, 
former Professor of History at the University of 
Wyoming, writes, her ministers preferred " see- 
ing the prisoner of war, the unredeemed hostage, 
the exiled culprit, enslaved rather than killed." 3 
While there was life, there was hope for the un- 
fortunates and the possibility of still aiding them. 
She next successfully bettered their lot and loos- 
ened their bonds. And finally, in large measure 
through the very force of her teaching, slavery 
gave way to serfdom. 

We must remember that in the barbaric as in 
the classical pagan society the slave could not be 
married, he had no personal rights which the 
master was bound to respect and no place in so- 
ciety. Both in Germanic and Roman law he was 
" on the level of cattle and other mobilia." Need 
we wonder, then, to behold him brutalized and 

3 Agnes Mathilde Wergeland, " Slavery in Germanic Society 
during the Middle Ages," p. 16. 



RECASTING THE WORLD 5 I 

degraded under the new paganism as under the 
old? Marked by the collar about his neck, his 
closely cropped and bristly hair, his often de- 
formed and mutilated body, and his branded and 
scarred skin, the slave was indeed an object of 
pity under paganism. 4 The mightiest influence 
to come to his relief was that of the Church, 
though she could not at once transform the spirit 
of the barbarian conquerors. As the author last 
quoted says : 

Another stronghold of hope for the slave was the power of 
the Roman Catholic Church. What the king represented within 
the political sphere the bishop represented within the moral. 
There is no doubt that, but for the constant good offices of the 
Church through her ministers, the improvement in the condi- 
tion of the slave would have been of far slower growth. The 
bishop, of course, could, as little as the king, interfere with 
actual ownership or abolish slavery; but he tried to exercise 
a religious as well as a practical pressure upon the slave- 
holder. On the one side, mild treatment of the slave was al- 
ways spoken of as one of the important evidences of a Chris- 
tian spirit; on the other side, the churches and monasteries 
were recognized places of refuge for the fugitive or abused 
slave, the priest or abbot before giving the slave over exact- 
ing an oath or promise from the slave-owner not to do their 
refugee further harm. 5 

Many quotations from different Councils can 
be given to this effect. Yet various churches and 
ecclesiastics, as we know, were large slaveholders. 
This is not surprising. " In this respect, as in 

4 Ibid., p. 23. 

5 Ibid., pp. 60, 61. 



52 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

many others, the Church [by which word the writer 
refers to the individual churches, with their ma- 
terial needs] had to conform to the economic con- 
ditions of the time." Yet it everywhere remained 
true that: u In holding slaves as cultivators of her 
enormous estates the Church made servitude as 
comfortable an existence as it could ever be- 
come. " 6 To this there was no exception. If 
monastery lands were used for selfish purposes, it 
could be done only in opposition to the teachings 
and the spirit of the Church herself. " Their 
ideal was not wealth, but welfare," says Father 
Bernard Vaughan, referring to these monks. 
14 They themselves being workers on the land 
knew how to sympathize with fellow toilers." 
This remained true to the end. 

Thus always the doctrines and principles of the 
Catholic Church were the very foundation of the 
new spirit of liberty that was to humanize the 
slave, safeguard his human rights and finally con- 
tribute so mightily to the destruction of slavery 
itself, and to bringing the world daily nearer to 
the true ideals of Christian democratic industry. 
It was from her monasteries that learning and art 
went forth over all the earth together with agri- 
culture and the crafts. They were everywhere 
the great centers of civilization not only from a 
religious, literary and social point of view, but 
also in a purely economic and industrial way. 

6 Ibid., p. 63. 



RECASTING THE WORLD 53 

11 As the monasteries," says the great German his- 
torian, Johannes Janssen, " had been for centuries 
the schools of agriculture and horticulture, so too 
they were the actual nurseries of all industrial and 
artistic progress. It was in these institutions that 
handicrafts first developed into art." 7 To the 
same effect Huber-Liebenau writes: " Immedi- 
ately upon the spread of Christianity churches and 
monasteries arose, and the latter were, until the 
fourteenth century, the nurseries of German 
industry and German art." 8 The same was true 
of every other land. Thus, to quote but a single 
instance where a volume might be filled with elo- 
quent testimonies, the historian of Belgium writes : 

If the conversion to the Catholic Faith was mainly the task 
of the missionaries, the introduction of civilization was mainly 
the task of monasteries. There the Benedictine monks played a 
very large part, both as civilizers and colonizers. Their monas- 
teries were, from the sixth century on, centers of economic and 
intellectual life. Whilst some of their monks attacked the thick 
forests of southern and central Belgium with axes, others en- 
gaged in literary labors in the monasteries* libraries, transcrib- 
ing the ancient Greek and Latin manuscripts, composing hymns 
and lives of saints, and opening schools for the education of the 
people. They planted in the very hearts of the people the roots 
of that strong religious spirit, which has steadily developed and 
which has become one of the characteristics of the national 
spirit of Belgium. 

Each monastery became a kind of model farm, where the 
population of the neighborhood could learn the best agricultural 
methods. In the monastery, too, they could find physicians who 

7 " History of the German People," II, p. 2. 

8 "Das Deutsche Zunftwesen im Mittelalter" p. 16. 



54 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

knew how to take care of the sick. The monastery, being pro- 
tected by the respect that was inspired by the saint to whom it 
was dedicated, was also a place of safety in time of danger. 
Consequently, dwellings became more and more numerous 
around the monasteries, and villages developed under their in- 
fluence and protection. 9 

More than this, while in many places the newly 
formed towns were forced to struggle for their 
liberties, or obtained them only after long de- 
lays, those founded by bishops and abbots, says 
Carlton J. H. Hayes, " received charters at the 
very outset." 10 So everywhere liberty went 
forth from the sanctuary close and the monastery 
walls in the meet company of learning and of la- 
bor. 

11 The movement for democracy in England was 
started by a monk," was the statement made in 
the Bible Room of Plymouth Church, Brooklyn, 
by so " advanced " a Protestant minister as the 
Rev. Dr. Newell Dwight Hillis. " They (the 
monks) carried civilization and Christianity in 
their arms, right during the Middle Ages and 
down to our times. " 1X The light of historic truth 
is gradually breaking through the darkness that 
had so long overclouded the post-Reformation 
mind. With the passing of old prejudices the 
facts of the past are emerging in the dawn of a 
clearer day. When the walls of Rheims Cathe- 

9 Leon Van Der Essen, "History of Belgium." 

10 " A Political and Social History of Europe," I, p. 37. 
J1 Brooklyn Daily Eagle, April 5, 1919. 



RECASTING THE WORLD 55 

dral trembled to the shock of the exploding shells 
the world with one voice acknowledged that it 
could not equal or reproduce the glory of those 
monuments of art the Middle Ages had be- 
queathed to us. 



CHAPTER VII 

SERFDOM AND THE CHURCH 

THE slavery described in the preceding 
chapter was already shading off imper- 
ceptibly into a state of serfdom. Eco- 
nomic and religious reasons often combined to 
bring about the passing away of slavery. Where 
economic conditions had already prepared the way, 
as in the Roman days when the masters of landed 
estates often found it more conducive to their in- 
terests permanently to settle certain slaves upon 
the land and transform them into serfs, the 
Church utilized her opportunities in still further 
promoting the human rights of the unfree laborer. 
So too, after the days of the barbarian conquest, 
it was through the influence of the Church that 
the personality of the slave came to be more re- 
ligiously respected and his family rights were 
rendered inviolate. A legal status was gradually 
assured him. He was granted property and even 
land. 

The serf of the Middle Ages could no longer 
be sold, although the soil to which he was insep- 
arably attached might be transferred with him to 
another lord. For his own benefit and for the 
support of his family he tilled the plot of 

56 



SERFDOM AND THE CHURCH 57 

land set aside for him. On this too his perma- 
nent home was built. Though certain levies 
might be made on him for the lord's table, his 
main obligation was to offer a more or less 
definite proportion of his labor-time to the service 
of his master. Such was the essence of serfdom, 
at least in its latter stages. 

While in the early days serfdom was but a 
mitigation of slavery, and often very similar to 
it, we find it developing anew at a later time as 
a consequence of military necessity among pre- 
viously free populations. In fact, this entire pe- 
riod seems to be largely covered with a haze of 
uncertainty. Free owners of land may in many 
instances have voluntarily assumed a condition of 
dependence which preserved them from the vio- 
lence of pirates and freebooters and thus assured 
them the yield of their harvest, not to mention the 
personal safety accorded by this means to them- 
selves and to their families. Their land itself 
would naturally pass into the ownership of the 
lord. How far this accounts for the widespread 
condition of serfdom is difficult to say. But of all 
this the following chapter shall treat more fully. 

As in the case of slavery, so in that of serfdom 
the Church was often instrumental in again lib- 
erating the serfs and everywhere successful in bet- 
tering their condition. She provided for their 
moral and religious welfare and for the enforce- 
ment of laws protecting them. Economically 



58 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

their lot was not necessarily bitter or hard. Their 
person and property were to be their own. Even 
their service to the feudal lord was more and 
more limited and was definitely restricted to cer- 
tain days, aside from special season and duties. 

To render the serf secure in his tenure of the 
soil the Church in Germany imposed a penance of 
three years' duration upon the master who arro- 
gated to himself the right of selling his serf. She 
made no distinction between the killing of a serf 
and a freeman. In England likewise special pen- 
ances were imposed for the manslaughter of a 
serf by a master. The Synod of Worms renewed 
in 868 a regulation which protected the serf even 
when guilty of capital punishment. " If any one 
has put to death, without judicial sentence, a serf 
guilty of a crime that is punishable by death, he is 
to atone for the shedding of blood by a penance 
of two years. " The more the rights of the serf 
were imperiled, the more the Church came for- 
ward in his defense. Not only did she protect 
him against the abuse of power, but in his day of 
need she took him to her bosom, clothed, fed and 
sheltered him. 

As a practical illustration of the success 
achieved by the Church in the liberation of the serf 
as well as of the slave we need but turn to the 
Anglo-Saxon documents of England which have 
survived the wars and vicissitudes of more than a 
thousand years. 



SERFDOM AND THE CHURCH 59 

Slavery was still the universal custom of the 
land when Catholicity achieved its triumph. 
When slavery had been abolished the condition of 
the early serf, attached to the soil, differed as yet 
but little from that of the slave, since both still 
remained completely at the mercy of their mas- 
ters. The Church alone was interested in the 
fate of one as of the other. But to abolish serf- 
dom by a stroke of the pen was no more possible 
than it had been to abolish slavery. In each case 
churchmen and monks accommodated themselves 
to the economic conditions of the times where these 
were not considered morally wrong in themselves. 
But as in apostolic days, so now the Church insisted 
upon the essential equality of all men before God, 
upon the precept of charity and the doctrine of 
universal brotherhood, and in particular upon the 
reward of mercy to be accorded to him who freed 
a brother from his bonds. Clerics themselves set 
the example, at times in a most signal manner. 
How quickly their lesson bore fruit is evident from 
the constant emancipation of slaves and serfs, 
often in great numbers, which instantly followed. 

That such actions were prompted by the faith 
which the Church had preached is clear from the 
purely spiritual reasons assigned in the ancient 
documents of manumission. " Geatflaed freed 
for God! s sake and for her soul's need, Ecceard 
the smith and Aelfstan and his wife, and all their 
offspring born and unborn; and Arcil and Cole, 



60 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

and Ecgferd Eadhun's daughter, etc., etc.," reads 
a characteristic document. 1 

In like manner Aelfred manumitted all his un- 
freed dependents u in the name of God and of His 
Saints," and prayed that they might not be op- 
pressed by any of his heirs or kinsmen. " But for 
God's love and my own soul's need will I that they 
shall enjoy their freedom and their choice; and I 
command in the name of the living God that no 
one disquiet them, either by demand of money or 
in any other way." 2 

Often dreadful curses are pronounced upon any 
one who would dare to set aside such dispositions, 
especially when made in a last will: " Christ 
blind him that setteth this aside." And again: 
11 Whoso undoeth this may he have the wrath of 
Almighty God and Saint Cuthbert." Such testa- 
tors had often during life been very kind to their 
serfs, so that doubtless in many cases it had been 
preferable to remain under their care and protec- 
tion. It is sufficiently common to find that such 
masters at their death not only freed their serfs 
but provided for them as a father would for his 
children. So Durcytel for his soul's benefit be- 
queathed a great part of his landed possessions to 
the church of St. Edmund, and part likewise to the 
bishop, u and let all my serfs be free, and let each 

i" Codex Diplomaticus," No. 925. 

2 " Cod. Dipl. t " Vid. Thorpe, Kemble, " The Saxons in Eng- 
land," I, p. 504. 



SERFDOM AND THE CHURCH 6 1 

have his toft, and his meatcow and his meat- 
corn. " 3 

The spiritual benefits asked were both for this 
life and for the next, and often for the soul of 
relative or friend: " This book witnesseth that 
Aelfwold freed Hwatu at St. Petroc's for his soul 
both during life and after life." 4 " x^nd I 
(Leofgyfu) will that all my serfs be free, both in 
manor and farm, for my sake and the sake of 
them that begot me (the souls of his parents)." 5 

It was moreover in the church and in the pres- 
ence of the priest that manumission took place. 
11 Here witnesseth on this book of Gospel/' we 
read in the record of the monastery of Bath, 
" that Aelfric the Scot and Aethelric the Scot are 
made free for the soul of Abbot Aelfsige, that 
they may be free forever. This is done by wit- 
ness of all the monastery." 6 So we read of 
Bishop Wulfsige freeing a number of serfs, " for 
Eadgar the King and for his own soul, at St. 
Petroc's altar." 7 The register of this church is 
preserved for us, and similar books of manumis- 
sion were evidently kept in every church, like the 
registers of baptisms and marriages. 

What was true in Saxon England was no less 
true of other countries. S. Sugenheim, in his his- 

3 " Cod. DipL/ $ No. 959. 

4 Register, St. Petroc's Church. Kemble. 
*" Cod. Dipl.r No. 931. 

*"Cod. Dipl.r No. 1351. 
7 " Cod. Dipl.r No. 981. 



6l DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

tory of the termination of serfdom in Europe, re- 
peatedly makes the same confession in spite of 
inveterate prejudices against the Church. He 
shows how in France the influence of the clergy 
was not seldom used to free the serf, or at least 
considerably to ease his burden. The frequent 
testamentary emancipations of serfs, often in 
great numbers, were, he tells us, " in almost every 
instance the work of pious and humane confessors 
or other priests. " Like all historians, he admits 
the truth of the proverbial saying that in every 
land it was well to dwell under episcopal rule. 
Thus in Germany dependent church laborers were 
employed in their duties only three days of the 
week. The remaining time could be devoted 
freely to their own interests. So too in other 
countries the Church led the way. 

In France the emancipation of serfs and hereditary tenants 
took place earliest in the ecclesiastical dominions, where, 
indeed, the condition of the dependent classes was always the 
most favorable. 8 

The efforts of the Church to ameliorate the lot 
of the serf or to free him entirely were, he be- 
lieves, perhaps nowhere more glorious than in 
Scandinavia. The resolution taken by Saint Cnut 
to abolish serfdom entirely throughout his do- 
minion he ascribes solely to the priesthood. " Of 
course, " he adds, " the last portion of the eleventh 

H Sugenheim, * Grschichtc der Aufhebung der Leibeigenschaft 
und Horigkeit in Euro pa," p. 90. 



SERFDOM AND THE CHURCH 63 

century was not yet ripe for this. The clergy 
nevertheless worked with indescribable zeal to 
hasten the time for it." 9 The institution of serf- 
dom, therefore, in spite of the frequency of eman- 
cipation by ecclesiastics or through their example 
and exhortation, could not at once be abolished. 
Particularly fortunate, however, were the laborers 
connected with religious houses. " Wherever 
monasteries arose," says Friederich Hurter, 
11 progress began, the condition of the people was 
improved and friendly relations with dependents 
existed." Oppression, in ecclesiastical dominions, 
he adds, was an exception and freedom could be 
obtained more readily. 10 Even Socialist authors, 
therefore, when prepared to make independent 
and unbiased investigation must come to the same 
conclusion. " The Christian Church," writes 
Thomas Kirkup, " did much to soften and to abol- 
ish slavery and serfdom." u 

Not only did bishops and priests, by their word 
and example, everywhere bring about a kindlier 
treatment and even the emancipation of the serfs, 
persistently influence legislation in their favor, 
throw about their person the protecting power of 
the Church, inspire men with sentiments of justice 
and affection in their regard as for true children 

9 Ibid., p. 501. 

10 Cf. t H. Pesch, S. J., " Liberalismus, Socialismus und christ- 
liche Geselschaftsordnung" pp. 664-685. 

11 " History of Socialism," 6th ed., p. 450. 



64 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

of God and brothers in Christ, but they freely 
admitted them to the sacred office of the priest- 
hood. Indeed there was no dignity within the 
power of the Church to bestow which might not 
be attained by the humblest serf. The Protestant 
Historian Kemble thus writes of the Catholic 
clergy in Anglo-Saxon days: 

Whatever their class interests may from time to time have 
led them to do, let it be remembered that they existed as a 
permanent mediating authority between the rich and the poor, 
the strong and the weak, and that, to their eternal honor, they 
fully comprehended and performed the duties of this noble 
position. To none but them would it have been permitted to 
stay the strong hand of power, to mitigate the just severity 
of the law, to hold out a glimmer of hope to the serf, to find a 
place in this world and a provision for the destitute, whose ex- 
istence the State did not even recognize. 12 

From what has already been said we are not 
surprised to find the statement made by this most 
thorough student of the period in question that the 
lot of the serf " was not necessarily or generally 
one of great hardship. It seems doubtful whether 
the labor exacted was practically more severe, or 
his remuneration much less than that of an agri- 
cultural laborer in this country (England) at this 
day (A. D. 1876)." 13 The Rev. J. Malet Lam- 
bert expresses a similar opinion of conditions of 
servitude at a later date. The spiritual and even 
the temporal provisions made for the serf, at- 

12 "The Saxons in England," II, pp. 374, 375. 

13 Ibid., I, pp. 213, 214. 



SERFDOM AND THE CHURCH 65 

tached, according to the custom of the day, to the 
land of some conscientious Catholic master, might 
well be envied by countless laborers in our modern 
civilization. 

44 In his hard life the serf of the Middle 
Ages," says von Berthold Missiaen, O. M. Cap., 
44 experienced a sense of true internal happiness, 
more lightsome than any known to the modern 
world of labor. He was filled with a living, re- 
ligious faith, and felt himself possessed of a strong, 
serious moral power." Religion had spiritually 
liberated him and made him a freeman of God, 
the peer of knight and earl before the King of 
kings. 

Faith, indeed, was living and active in Anglo- 
Saxon days. We behold the spectacle of kings at 
the height of their glory renouncing all their tem- 
poral possessions and laying aside their crowns 
to devote themselves entirely to lives of self-re- 
nunciation; of noble ladies and princesses retiring 
from the world to live for God alone in the se- 
clusion of the cloister; of men of influence and 
power, with all the temptations of the world be- 
fore them, thirsting only to suffer and die for 
Christ. Such a spirit of necessity reflected upon 
the economic conditions of the age. Though the 
time had not yet come for the universal emancipa- 
tion of the serf, he was not unfrequently freed 
from bondage, as we have seen, and always 
treated with far greater consideration than could 



66 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

have been shown him otherwise. An undeniable 
hardness which still remained in certain customs of 
the day must be explained by the difficulty of at 
once obliterating every trace of pagan spirit and 
tradition, and by the life of constant warfare and 
danger to which men were then exposed. To 
quote once more from the pages of Kemble : 

It was especially the honor and glory of Christianity that, 
while it broke the spiritual bonds of sin, it ever actively la- 
bored to relieve the heavy burden of social servitude. We are 
distinctly told that Bishop Wilfrid, on receiving the grant of 
Selsey from Caedwealha, of Wessex, immediately manumitted 
two hundred and fifty unfortunates whom he found there at- 
tached to the soil, that those whom by Baptism he had res- 
cued from servitude to devils might by the grant of liberty 
be rescued from servitude to man. In this spirit of charity the 
clergy obtained respite from labor for the serf on the Sab- 
bath, on certain high festivals and on the days which pre- 
ceded or followed them. The lord who compelled his serf 
to labor between the sunset on Saturday and the sunset on 
Sunday forfeited him altogether; probably first to the king or 
the geref a ; but in the time of Cnut, the serf thus forfeited was 
to become folkfree. To their merciful intervention it must 
also be ascribed that the will of a Saxon proprietor, laic as 
well as clerical, so constantly directed the manumission of a 
number of serfs for the soul's health of the testator. 14 

The first duty of the Church, it must be borne in 
mind, was not to free the slave or serf, but to save 
his soul. Her chief effort, which was to be car- 
ried out in the face of all resistance, was to pro- 
cure for him conditions under which ample leisure 
and opportunity might be afforded him to serve 

14 Ibid., II, pp. 211, 212. 



SERFDOM AND THE CHURCH 67 

God becomingly and even perfectly. Equally 
with lord and king, he was declared by her to be in 
all truth her own spiritual child, sanctified in Holy 
Baptism, strengthened by the reception of her Sac- 
raments, made partaker of the same eucharistic 
Christ in the sacrifice of the Mass, destined to an 
eternal fellowship with angels and saints, and al- 
ready emancipated by the grace of God from the 
one slavery which alone is supremely terrible, the 
bondage of sin and Satan. 

Here then was that potent seed of Christian 
liberty already striking root. Within it were con- 
tained all the elements of a perfect social order. 
Bourgeoning forth centuries later, in a soil pre- 
pared by ages of Catholic culture, it was to blossom 
at length into the world's most ideal democracy, 
a true brotherhood in commerce and industry, 
made perfect in the unity of that one faith which 
Christ had founded. 



CHAPTER VIII 

THE FEUDAL AND MANORIAL SYSTEMS 

DURING the early ages of modern civiliza- 
tion trade gilds among our first Christian 
freemen were long to remain impossible 
for the simple reason that specialized trades were 
not sufficiently developed among them. The ear- 
liest gilds of the Middle Ages were therefore re- 
ligious and social in their nature. Often they 
were mainly devoted to the preservation of order 
and peace at a time when marauding and violence 
were common, when governments, as we have 
seen, were not yet centralized, and when the great 
cities of the future were only in their first process 
of formation or development. 

Civilization from the eighth to the eleventh 
century was indeed as remote from our own in 
kind as in time. The method of production which 
then prevailed is known to-day as the Family Sys- 
tem. Its essential feature consisted in the fact 
that each household produced all that was needed 
for its own consumption without the aid of ex- 
ternal agents. It was to be followed in the course 
of economic development by the gild system, the 
domestic system, and lastly by the stage of pro- 
duction, technically known as the factory system, 

68 



THE FEUDAL AND MANORIAL SYSTEMS 69 

which continued unbroken to the World War. 

Life, in its economic aspect, was almost entirely 
agricultural. Near the little village were the 
fields where each family cultivated the strips of 
land assigned to it or owned by it. There were 
meadowlands w r here the cattle were pastured in 
common, and forests where each villager might 
gather or cut the wood that was needed. Under 
the most fully developed system in England, each 
family owned a number of narrow strips of land, 
not adjoining each other, but scattered over en- 
tirely different sections of the fields reserved for 
cultivation. No one could thus receive only the 
most fertile or only the poorest soil. Every one 
might have a fair proportion of both. 

At the period when this system had reached its 
complete development each strip was sown suc- 
cessively with a fall crop the first year and a spring 
crop the next, while the third year it was permitted 
to lie fallow. The result was an abundance of 
all the necessaries of life, if no disaster occurred 
to ruin the crops. Each family produced inde- 
pendently all that was needed for existence, for 
clothing, food and shelter. The Church provided 
in her turn for every spiritual want. The system 
was not ideal, neither, however, was it deplorable 
as conditions often existing in more modern times. 
The evils of the city slums were then unknown. 
The poet Goldsmith thus pictures it in his " De- 
serted Village " : 



70 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

A time there was ere England's griefs began, 
When every rood of ground maintained its man: 
For him light labor spread her wholesome store, 
Just gave what life required but gave no more: 
His best companions, innocence and health; 
And his best riches, ignorance of wealth. 

How far or how long this developed form of 
organization, in which cooperation and private 
ownership were combined, existed under the dem- 
ocratic control of free farmers will doubtless be 
difficult to say. In the period when we find this 
system of cultivation widely employed throughout 
England, Germany, France, Hungary and other 
countries, the land is usually in the possession of 
a lord, whose residence is known as the manor. 
It may be merely a substantial dwelling or else 
a lordly castle overlooking the humble thatched 
roofs of the villagers beneath. The estate of a 
single nobleman might at times consist not merely 
of a single manor, with its group of farms that 
formed a primitive village, but of many such man- 
ors extending over a great tract of land or an en- 
tire district. Hence the name under which this 
phase of feudalism is commonly known, the Man- 
orial System. 1 

While there were still independent farmers and 
tenant farmers, the majority of the population in 
the Norman days of England came to be known 

1 Carlton J. H. Hayes, " A Political and Social History of 
Europe," I, pp. 28-36. — Thomas Nixon Carver, "Principles of 
Rural Economics," pp. 37-44. — James E. Thorold Rogers. 



THE FEUDAL AND MANORIAL SYSTEMS 7 1 

as u villeins," a name significantly derived from 
14 villagers." They were not slaves, since they 
could neither be sold nor deprived of their right 
to cultivate for themselves the strips of land which 
they tilled for their exclusive benefit. Neither 
were they tenant farmers, since they paid no rent 
for the land which they used and handed on to 
their children to be tilled by them in turn for their 
own benefit, as an inalienable right. Neither how- 
ever were they free, since they were " attached to 
the soil " on which they were bound to stay. 
They were serfs, therefore, yet their status, ap- 
parently, was superior to that of this class among 
the early Anglo-Saxons. 

In lieu of rent, since money was not then in 
circulation, they rendered personal service to their 
lord. A portion of arable land, reserved for the 
latter, was known as the " demesne." Here two 
or three days of the week the villein worked for 
his master, besides performing other duties as 
emergency might suggest, known as corvee. So 
too he afforded assistance to his lord at harvest 
time in what were then called the "boon-days," be- 
sides supplying him with certain provisions. Such 
therefore was the institution of villeinage, the 
more modern form of serfdom. At times, how- 
ever, the villein preferred to render up his personal 
lands, and to labor exclusively for the lord on his 
own farm or in his home, retaining possibly a small 
plot of ground and a garden for himself and his 



72 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

family. Special classes of small tenants were the 
bordars, crofters and cotters. In the beginning a 
class of slaves still existed, but these soon disap- 
peared. 

In Germany, as also in France, there gradually 
developed the Great Mdierhofe, with their num- 
bers of unfree laborers, the Horige cultivating the 
farms of the lords, and the Diensthorige attend- 
ing to housework and craftsmanship. Even from 
the earliest times, according to Walther Miiller, 
the latter might labor for their own profits when 
the domestic needs of their lords were satisfied. 
The manorial system in Germany will be dealt 
with more in detail in Chapter X of the present 
volume, " Labor under Charlemagne and After." 

The origin of the great power given to the 
lord has already been accounted for. The early 
settlements of the newly emerging civilization 
found themselves exposed to attacks from all sides. 
There were not only the marauding bands of rob- 
bers infesting the forests and ready at all times 
for pillage and plunder, but the pirate crews that 
everywhere sailed the high seas and, like the 
Homeric heroes of old, swooped down on the de- 
fenseless villages as their lawful prize, to rob, 
massacre or enslave the unfortunate inhabitants. 
Such was a gentleman's profession among the 
pagan Vikings. It was necessary therefore for 
men to group about a powerful leader and to se- 
cure the protection which in times of raid could 



THE FEUDAL AND MANORIAL SYSTEMS 73 

be offered by the lordly manor and the unscale- 
able walls of a medieval castle. Its master was 
fighter and captain by profession. There too 
were the trained men of arms and the weapons 
ever ready at hand. It was therefore the neces- 
sary center of organization and defense, and the 
villagers gladly offered, in return for the protec- 
tion accorded them, the service of their toil on 
stated days and in certain seasons. 

Governments were not as yet evolved and cen- 
tralized, so that men would look in vain for as- 
sistance to the King. Their own lord was their 
natural and willing defender, while he himself 
rendered fealty to a still greater lord, on whose 
help he might be forced to call at any moment of 
extreme peril and in whom he could find a new 
center of a wider and far more powerful organiza- 
tion. Thus every man gave obedience and hom- 
age to one above him to secure the measure of co- 
operation required for self-defense. 

This therefore is the much-maligned feudal 
system which was a real blessing and necessity in 
its origin, and like every other system proved a 
burden and a just cause of discontent when its 
usefulness had ceased and its very reason for ex- 
istence had passed away. This time arrived when 
the King himself was able to defend his realm 
and preserve law and order. The nobility, which 
had steadily grown in power and wealth, now 
merely lived upon the toil of the peasantry with- 



74 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

out rendering any adequate service in return. 
Hence the peasants often sought their freedom by 
fleeing to the newly founded cities, when these 
gradually developed, or at times rose in arms 
against their lords. Such was the bloody Peas- 
ants' War which practically ended for the time the 
growth of the Reformation. In defense of his 
own princes Luther threw the weight of his per- 
sonal power against the German serfs who had 
arisen against their lords and so crushed their 
hopes of freedom for generations to come. This 
they neither forgot nor forgave. Catholic as 
well as Protestant princes had misused their power 
and driven their serfs to desperation. 

In many cases the serfs purchased their own 
liberty. Personal service rendered by them to the 
lord was gradually replaced to a great extent by 
money payment or they became hired laborers. 
In France the great majority of the serfs had al- 
ready purchased their freedom by the fourteenth 
century, although in some few districts serfdom 
survived until the French Revolution. In Eng- 
land it had practically disappeared by the six- 
teenth century. In various other countries it was 
retained until the nineteenth century, and in Rus- 
sia even until the latter half of that century. 

The institutions here described naturally be- 
came more and more tyrannical and oppressive as 
they outlived their usefulness. Yet even in their 
decline during the later period of the Middle 



THE FEUDAL AND MANORIAL SYSTEMS 75 

Ages they were preferable to conditions existing 
in modern cities during the " progressive M nine- 
teenth century. " Feudalism/' admits Percy 
Stickney Grant, " gave the serf food, shelter and 
clothing in exchange for his labor and his military 
service. The serf had his stated place. He was 
a small partner in the concern and shared its 
profits." 

He then compares it with the wage system to 
the disadvantage of the latter : " In time of war 
the State can take over the worker's industrial or 
military service, but in time of peace it does not 
insure him subsistence." 2 

The general method of production during the 
early Middle Ages was everywhere the same, in 
so far at least that each household, as we have 
seen, produced for itself whatever it needed to 
satisfy its own wants, without recourse to external 
manufactures. A few simple luxuries might at 
intervals be purchased by the lord of the manor 
or might later also find their way to the home of 
the peasant, but for the rest each family, or fam- 
ily group, such as manor or monastery, was pro- 
ducer and consumer alike. It felled the trees to 
build its dwellings. It spun the wool to make its 
garments. It planted and ground the corn to 
bake its own bread. With meadow and forest 
open to it, with its cattle, though not of registered 
breed, and its hives of bees, such as Virgil sang, 

2 " Fair Play for the Worker," p. 22. 



76 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

it might feast on the Scriptural butter and honey, 
and live contentedly and happily in its state of the 
" simple life." Such was the bright side of this 
early life which had likewise its shadows and 
gloom. And yet, as Carlton J. H. Hayes says: 

On the other hand we must not forget that the tenement 
houses of our great cities have been crowded in the nine- 
teenth century with people more miserable than ever was 
serf of the Middle Ages. The serf, at any rate, had the open 
air instead of a factory in which to work. When times were 
good he had grain and meat in plenty, and possibly wine or 
cider, and he hardly envied the tapestried chambers, the be- 
jeweled clothes, and the spiced foods of the nobility, for he 
looked upon them as belonging to a different world. 

In one place noblemen and peasant met on a common foot- 
ing — in the village church. There, on Sundays and feast- 
days, they came together as Christians to hear Mass ; and after- 
wards, perhaps, holiday games and dancing on the green, be- 
nignantly patronized by the lord's family, helped the common 
folk to forget their labors. The village priest, himself often 
of humble birth, though the most learned man on the manor, 
was at once the friend and benefactor of the poor and the 
spiritual doctor of the lord. Occasionally a visit of the bishop 
to administer confirmation to the children afforded an oppor- 
tunity for gaiety and universal festivity. 3 

Not a few of the English manors, like similar 
establishments upon the continent, were in the 
possession of monasteries or of ecclesiastics. In 
the former case they may have been left to com- 
munities of religious by the wills of the Faithful 
or were bestowed upon them by the liberality of 

3 " A Political and Social History of Europe," Vol. I, pp. 35, 

36. 



THE FEUDAL AND MANORIAL SYSTEMS 77 

kings or nobles. Churchmen and religious in 
such instances simply conformed to the universal 
custom of their day. Whatever greed or ambi- 
tion existed on the part of certain powerful pre- 
lates or abbots, it was the individual alone that 
was at fault. The monks themselves were, as a 
class, loved by the people. Of this we have abund- 
ant historical evidence. They were truly the 
stewards of the poor and their doors were ever 
open to the houseless wanderer. Referring to the 
Religious Orders of the twelfth and thirteenth 
centuries, an Anglican historian, the Very Rev. W. 
R. W. Stephens, formerly Dean of Winchester, 
writes : 

They were large landowners, and this was in many ways a 
benefit to the people. The monks were continually resident, 
whereas the bishops and many of the lay proprietors were fre- 
quently called away from their estates on public affairs, and 
so hindered from looking closely after the welfare of their 
tenants. In districts where the towns were rare and small, 
the monastic houses must have been inestimable boons, not 
only to the traveler, who could obtain food and shelter there, 
but to the resident poor in the neighborhood. The condition 
of the people in many a secluded village or hamlet would 
have been wretched and barbarous in the extreme but for 
some monastic houses which had the means of remunerating 
labor and relieving distress. 4 

The mistake of modern writers in dealing with 
this period too frequently consists in merely re- 
peating the inveterate prejudices of past centuries 
without any profound research into a subject so 

4 " A History of the English Church," Vol. II, p. 272. 



78 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

little understood. A twentieth century point of 
view moreover prevents them from ever realizing 
the vast difference in social, political and economic 
conditions and needs that separates those times 
from our own, and the equally vast difference of 
mental attitude towards the most vital questions 
under consideration. They will therefore no 
doubt be startled to know that so important an 
authority upon the economics of the Middle Ages 
as Damaschke assures us that a degree of general 
social welfare and true popular happiness was 
reached under the feudal system which surpasses 
our very conception. Even at its worst the feudal 
system was a vast progress over the best condi- 
tions of labor that had ever existed in the pagan 
world of classical antiquity. 5 

As for more modern times, what was the end 
of all the vaunted civilization of the smug, self- 
satisfied nineteenth century except boundless dis- 
satisfaction, unhappiness and not seldom abject 
misery such as the Middle Ages never knew? A 
clarification of our social vision is sadly needed, 
and this we trust our study of those same ages at 
their height of development will give to us in the 
picture of that Christian democracy of industry 
that was at length to be reached as the economic 
realization of their Catholic ideals. 

5 J. E. T. Rogers constantly refers to medieval labor condi- 
tions as relatively preferable to those of his day. "A History 
of Agriculture and Prices," etc. 



CHAPTER IX 

PEACE GILDS 

WE have studied the position of the un- 
free or partially freed laborer. Go- 
ing back again to the first centuries of 
the Middle Ages we can now in turn view the con- 
dition of the freemen of that early period as we 
behold them leagued together in the frith (peace) 
gilds of Europe, more than a thousand years ago. 
In the laws of King Xne, about the year 690, we 
first meet with the word gegyldan. We find it 
again in the laws of King Alfred enacted two 
centuries later. The meaning of that word seems 
now to be fairly clear. 

The gegyldan were comrades mutually responsi- 
ble for each other before the law T , and leagued to- 
gether for self-protection as well as for the preser- 
vation of peace and order. The name Frith 
(Frieden in modern German) or " peace " gilds, 
is therefore often given to these institutions. 
They were gilds only in the wide sense of the 
word since they were not voluntary organizations. 
The freemen of the early Saxon towns were di- 
vided into groups of ten, known as tithings. Ten 
such groups in turn formed a hundred. The 

79 



80 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

statutes regulating them were made the law of the 
land, and in the time of Athelstan we find them 
drawn up by the ecclesiastical and civil authorities. 

11 This is the ordinance," begins the official doc- 
ument, " which the bishops and reeves of London 
have ordained and confirmed among our frith 
gilds, both of thanes and of churls. ... Be it re- 
solved that we count every ten men together, and 
the chief one to direct the nine in each of those 
duties which we have all ordained; and afterwards 
the hundreds (hyndens) of them together, and 
one hundred-man (hynden-man, centurion) who 
shall admonish the ten for the common benefit." l 
The eleven officers were to hold and disburse the 
money, gild or geld, from which it is argued by 
some that the gild was named. We can readily, 
therefore, reconcile the two translations of gegyl- 
dan as gild-brethren 2 or pay-brethren. 3 

Although the question of labor does not enter 
here, except very indirectly, the frith gilds are of 
great interest from a civic and economic point of 
view, no less than in their cultural and historic 
aspect. 

The earliest Saxon gild legislation which we pos- 
sess in the laws of Ine and Alfred is concerned 
with the payment of the wergild, or blood money, 
which was to be paid in those primitive times when 



1 Judicia Civitatis Lundon'ict, Athelstan V. Thorpe, I, p. 230. 

2 Dr. Stuubs. 

3 Schmid, " Gesetze," p. 589. 



PEACE GILDS 8 I 

one man had killed another. Such laws were 
common among all the Germanic tribes. We find 
them among the Saxons, the Bavarians, the Ala- 
manni, the Frisians, the Visigoths, the Salian 
Franks and others. A definite price was set upon 
every head, from king to freedman. Among the 
Saxons, it is thought that the wergild to be paid 
for a noble who had been killed was 1,440 shill- 
ings; for a freeman, 240; and for a freedman who 
had once been in bondage, 120. Money values, 
of course, cannot even remotely be compared with 
those of the present day. A slave, according to 
the London statutes, was to be compensated for 
at the maximum rate of half a pound, or less, " ac- 
cording to his value." 

Since in many cases the man who had committed 
the deed could not pay his penalty, the relatives 
and the gildsmen were held responsible for a share. 
Thus, according to King Alfred's laws, if the man 
was without paternal relatives, but had relatives 
on his mother's side, the latter were to pay one- 
third of the blood money; his gegyldan, one-third 
and he himself the remaining portion. If he was 
without any relatives, the payment was to be made 
in equal shares by the gegyldan and himself. 
Without entering into the intricacies of this law, 
it is evident at once that the gild implied a soli- 
darity almost as close as a family bond. This 
conclusion is important since it gives a true insight 
into the nature of gild life. 



82 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

In studying these conditions, we realize at the 
same time the difficulties encountered by the 
Church throughout the European world in u tam- 
ing and humanizing the countless petty chieftains 
and evolving Christian chivalry out of violence and 
brutality." The first mention of the gegyldan, it 
should be noted, is coincident with the victory of 
Catholicity over paganism. The earliest gilds, 
though far from perfect, were already in many 
ways a great power for good. Kemble says : 

If a crime were committed, the gyld were to hold the crim- 
inal to his answer; to clear him, if they could conscientiously 
do so, by making oath in his favor, to aid him in paying his 
fine if found guilty. If flying from justice he admitted his 
crime, they were to purge themselves on oath from all guilty 
knowledge of the act, and all participation in his flight, failing 
which they were themselves to suffer mulct in proportion to his 
offense. On the other hand they were to receive at least a 
portion of the compensation for his death, or of such other 
sums as passed from hand to hand during the process of an 
Anglo-Saxon suit. 4 

The object, therefore, of these gilds or tith- 
ings was to maintain the public peace; to preserve 
11 the life, honor and property M of individuals; to 
bring the guilty to justice and provide defenders 
for the injured and the innocent, at a time when 
the power of the government was insufficient for 
these purposes. The power possessed by the 
gilds was legally delegated, and their retributive 
actions did not therefore correspond to the mod- 

* John Mitchell Kemble, " The Saxons of England " I, p. 252. 



PEACE GILDS 83 

ern lynch law, which presumes to take justice into 
its own hands without any legal sanction. 

Private warfare, however, had been considered 
an inalienable right of the Germanic freeman in 
his pagan state. With his conversation every at- 
tempt was made to set legal limits to its continu- 
ance until it could be entirely abolished. Only 
where the existence of the family seemed to re- 
quire it did the laws of Alfred tolerate such war- 
fare, or where the offender made peaceful settle- 
ment impossible, in which case the injured party 
would have the support of the State. So again 
Edmund, towards the middle of the tenth cen- 
tury, deliberated with the counsel of his Witan: 
" First, how I might best promote Christianity. 
Then seemed it to" us first most needful that we 
should most firmly preserve peace and harmony 
among ourselves, throughout all my dominion. 
Both I and all of us hold in horror the unright- 
eous and manifold fightings that exist among our- 
selves." 5 

It must not, however, be supposed that the pay- 
ment of the wergild necessarily implied that hu- 
man life had been taken. It included every 
peaceful settlement of feuds by means of money 
and all the fines that might be exacted for any 
injury, personal or domestic, or even for the as- 
persion of a man's good name. 

5 Ibid., I, pp. 251, 274. Eadm. Sec. Leg., Section 1. Thorpe, 
I, p. 246. 



84 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

The complete statutes, however, of the frith 
gilds under Athelstan, from which we have al- 
ready quoted, open for us a much wider view. 
We there come upon institutions of great eco- 
nomic, as well as legal, importance. They were 
not only the police departments of their day, free 
from all suspicion of graft, but the insurance com- 
panies, mutual benefit associations, purgatorial so- 
cieties, and even to a certain degree the courts of 
justice — all in one — for the happy gildsman. 
Though imposed from without, they already con- 
tain much of the spirit of the free gilds which 
were now soon to arise. 

One of their chief purposes was the recovery of 
stolen property. Where this was not possible 
compensation was made to the loser from the gild 
funds, or by a pro rata tax upon the brethren. A 
limit, however, was clearly set for the maximum 
amount to be paid for the unrecovered article. 
The pursuit of the thief was undertaken in com- 
mon. If caught, summary justice was executed 
upon him. A reward of twelve shillings, in fact, 
was set upon the open killing of a thief by any of 
the brethren. The utterly unprotected condition 
of the citizens, which laid them open to pillage and 
robbery, led to such severity. The property that 
could be stolen consisted mainly in live stock and 
slaves. If the latter " stole themselves," i. e., 
ran away, they met the fate of a thief when caught. 
To compensate the owner each gildsman who pos- 



PEACE GILDS 85 

sessed a slave contributed id. or half a penny. 
In particular legislations we can see the efforts 
made by the Church to shield offenders, especially 
if young and amenable to correction, while the in- 
stitution of slavery, as well as the savage right of 
feud, was fast disappearing under her influence. 
She was doing what lay in her power to protect the 
unfortunate and promote Christian charity, ad- 
vancing the great work of Christian Democracy. 

The patience required to change certain im- 
memorial customs and traditions, originally con- 
ceived in the spirit of a religion that had wor- 
shiped in the name of Thor and Wodan and to 
substitute in their place the practices of a faith 
which meekly bowed the neck of the fierce war- 
rior beneath the sweet yoke of Christ, is often but 
little understood by the historian and critic. 

The frith gilds in the ninth, tenth and eleventh 
centuries were as far removed from paganism as 
the dawn from the darkness, but the full day had 
not yet broken. Religion, charity and brother- 
hood were already strong and dominant principles 
in their statutes. And yet we cannot be surprised 
that something of a pagan hardness should still 
remain over from a time which was not as yet so 
far removed. Governments, moreover, while un- 
able to protect the individual, believed themselves 
forced to countenance stringent measures and regu- 
lations that the country might not fall a prey to 
marauding bands of robbers. 



86 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

Referring to the material aspect of the London 
ordinances, H. F. Coote writes : 

The regulations and provisions of this gild command our 
unqualified respect. They are irrefutable evidence of a high 
state of civilization. We have in them a scheme of mutual 
assurance, with all the appliances of carrying it out, combined 
with thorough comprehension of the true principle upon which 
such schemes are founded, and can alone be supported. For 
the gild not only satisfies itself that the claim is honest, but 
repudiates payment of it whenever the claimant has shown 
himself to have been contributory by his negligence to the 
loss of which he affects to complain. And, lastly, the gild, to 
secure the society against claims of unlimited and overwhelm- 
ing amount, establishes a maximum rate of compensation.® 

The religious element, however, was not for- 
gotten. " And we have also ordained, " wrote the 
drafters of the London statutes, " respecting every 
man who gives his pledge in our gildship, that 
should he die, each gild-brother (gegylda) shall 
give a gesuj el-loaf for his soul (a loaf of bread 
offered to the poor in alms for the repose of the 
departed soul) and sing fifty (psalms) or cause 
the same to be sung within thirty days." 7 The 
offering of Masses for this purpose was of course, 
most common, as we find in the statutes of the true 
voluntary gilds which were now to come into ex- 
istence. It may be noted that in one instance the 
singing of the Psalter or the offering of a Mass is 
left to the choice of the gildsman. 

6 Henry Charles Coote, F. S. A. "Transactions of the Lon- 
don and Middlesex Archeological Society," IV, p. 12. 
* Ibid. 



PEACE GILDS 87 

Charity, too, although it began at home, did not 
remain there. The poor and afflicted were the 
objects of special consideration, and pilgrims were 
helped upon their way to accomplish their pious 
vows or to satisfy their devotion by kneeling at the 
tomb of our Lord or praying at the sites of His 
sacred passion and death in distant Palestine. It 
was evident that under these Christian influences 
the remnants of pagan harshness were soon to 
melt away like the last drifts of winter's snow be- 
neath the genial sun of the new springtime of 
Catholic charity. 

From the earliest origin indeed of the medieval 
gilds, a Catholic spirit was already breathing 
through them. Even in their most primitive days 
it was felt like a waft of Spring through the misty 
forests, awakening the newly organized institu- 
tions to a newness of freedom and a fulness of 
life and beauty which paganism could never know. 
If something of the chill and gloom of earlier tra- 
ditions doubtless still clung to them, it was gradu- 
ally yielding to the warmth of Christian charity 
and the light of Christian truth. The world was 
slowly being prepared for its first concept of the 
full scope of Christian Democracy. 

Frith gilds in fine were not limited to the Saxons 
in England, but were common likewise upon the 
continent. The same conditions called forth the 
same remedy. In France they were organized by 
the bishops. " Each diocese," writes Unwin, 



88 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

11 became the center of a large association which 
embraced all classes, peasant and noble, cleric and 
lay, town and country." They were known as La 
Paix, or La Commune de la Paix, a name identical 
in meaning with the Saxon frith gilds which we 
have here described. 



CHAPTER X 

LABOR UNDER CHARLEMAGNE AND 
AFTER 

THE world gild itself, geldonia in Carlo- 
vingian Latin, occurs for the first time in 
the year 779. It is found in a law is- 
sued by Charlemagne, decreeing that no one should 
thenceforth presume " to bind himself by mutual 
oaths in a gild." From the mistakes made by the 
earliest copyists in transcribing this term we may 
reasonably conclude that it was not yet in common 
use. 

In 821 the lords of Flanders were cautioned, 
under penalty of heavy fines, to prevent their serfs 
from forming associations binding under oath. 
Similar injunctions were again issued in a capi- 
tulary of the year 884. The clergy as well as 
public officials were to instruct the serfs " not to 
enter into the combination commonly called a gild 
(quam vulgo geldam vocant) 9 against those who 
may have stolen anything." x The serfs, in other 
words, were not to take the law into their own 
hands, but to leave its execution to the proper au- 
thorities. Such associations would doubtless have 
helped to protect them in those unsettled times, 

1 Cap. A. 884. Pertz, I, 553. 

89 



90 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

but a serious menace was seen in them for the 
State. 

Modern authors in general vie with each other 
in their denunciations of Charlemagne for his at- 
tempted suppression of the gilds, confounding 
them with the craft gilds of later years. Centur- 
ies were still to elapse before economic and social, 
as well as political conditions, could make these 
organizations possible. Moreover, it was not 
against the gilds, but against the oaths, which he 
believed might lead to conspiracies and national 
danger, that the legislation was directed. Politi- 
cal and civic conditions were in a ferment. The 
centralization of power was real only in so far as 
it depended upon the personal influence of Charle- 
magne himself. Disruption in fact followed the 
very instant that the grasp of his own strong hand 
was relaxed in death. 

But another reason also existed for the suppres- 
sion of some of these early gilds. Their secret 
conclaves, it is believed, were in some cases merely 
a cloak for continuing the idolatrous practices 
which had survived from heathen times. That 
pagan organizations, somewhat similar in purpose 
to the gilds of the Frankish serfs and the Anglo- 
Saxon freemen, had existed among the ancient 
Teutons is sufficiently established. The old Ger- 
man warriors met and mingled their blood and 
drank it as a mutual pledge that they would defend 
and avenge each other. M Dost thou recall, 



LABOR UNDER CHARLEMAGNE AND AFTER 9 1 

Odin," says Loki in the Lokasenna, " how when 
our pledge began, we mingled blood together? " 

It is not surprising therefore that the Church 
should at times have been obliged publicly to for- 
bid such organizations, even as duty compels her 
to do in our day. Thus a canon of the Council 
of Nantes forbids " collectae vel confratriae, quas 
consortia vocant" It is unreasonable to inveigh 
against such regulations. Mistakes may undoubt- 
edly have been made, and even personally selfish 
motives may have swayed individual ecclesiastics; 
but the Church herself has from the first been the 
champion of all reasonable freedom of organiza- 
tion. Even the oath itself, which at every period 
was regarded an essential condition for admission 
to the gilds, was never in principle forbidden, and 
virtually never opposed by her in practice during 
the entire course of the Middle Ages. 

But the Church was no passive spectator of the 
progress of the gilds. Her fostering care was 
one of the mightiest factors in their development. 
As George Unwin says in relation to the earliest 
Frankish gilds : 

Apart from the reference to the mutual oath, nothing is 
said of the religious character of these associations; but in 
that age the cooperation, official or unofficial, of the clergy 
was an almost indispensable element of any 'popular organiza- 
tion. We also know that by the middle of the ninth cen- 
tury the clergy of the diocese of Rheims were allowed to 
superintend the formation of religious gilds bearing essen- 
tially the same character as those which, throughout the 



92 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

Middle Ages, underlay every form of social and economic 
organization. 2 

These religious gilds indeed are of the highest 
importance in the history of labor, since from 
them in many cases the labor gilds were later to 
arise, directly or indirectly. Such was especially 
the case where the establishment of such unions, 
whether of tradesmen or of journeymen, was re- 
garded with suspicion, while the Church harbored 
and fostered them. 

In the time of Charlemagne many of the trades 
already existed; but the tradesmen themselves 
were largely of servile condition. They were 
often perfectly organized; but never by their own 
initiative. The serfs and other unfree laborers 
— among whom must be numbered not only me- 
chanics, but even small dealers and professional 
artists — were at times grouped according to oc- 
cupations by the lord to whose manor they were 
attached. Servants, hunters and shepherds were 
similarly organized. The entire institution was 
known as the Frohnhof or manor. The laborers 
thus employed were known as Horige or serfs. 
Each division was under its master, who had the 
power of exercising judgment and correction, un- 
less a misdemeanor occurred which was to be re- 
ferred to a higher official. The last court of ap- 
peal was the lord of the manor himself, whose 
power was limited, however, by the law of the 

2 "The Gilds and Companies of London," p. 17. 



LABOR UNDER CHARLEMAGNE AND AFTER 93 

land. 3 It is evident that these organizations could 
in no sense be spoken of as gilds. 

The unfree craftsmen did not, however, work 
exclusively for their lord. Their duties were 
variously limited, and the remaining time was 
given to labor for their own profit. They might 
either dwell in the manor itself or in the vicinity. 
Many would probably take up their home in the 
lord's manor during the time devoted to his serv- 
ice. Charlemagne himself was liberally supplied 
at his various manors with skilled craftsmen and 
even expert artists: " workers in gold and silver, 
blacksmiths, shoemakers, turners, wagon-makers, 
carpenters, armorers, lace-makers, soap-boilers, 
brewers and bakers." Many interesting details 
regarding the system employed by him are to be 
found in the Capitulare de Villis of the years 809 
and 812. 4 

In the Lex Burgundionum it is definitely stated 
that the unfree craftsmen were not exclusively en- 
gaged by their masters, but were permitted pub- 
licly to practise their various trades. 5 Such, in the 
opinion of Miiller, was the custom during the en- 
tire period of serfdom. 6 They might sell their 
wares or their labor. In the " Vita Gebehardi" 7 

3 Dr. Otto Gierke, " Das deutsche Genossenschaftsrecht," pp. 
176-178. 

4 Pertz, I and III. 

5 " Liber Constitutionum." 

•Walther Miiller, " Zur Frage des Ursprungs der Mittelalter- 
lichen Ziinfte," pp. 47, ff. 7 Cap. 19. 



94 . DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

we read how the Bishop organized his craftsmen 
in the city of Constance according to their differ- 
ent trades, with a master set over each single craft. 
They were to spend certain days at the Mon- 
astery of Peterhausen, near the city, where they 
received their meals and performed the neces- 
sary work. They would then return to their 
shops and their homes in Constance. This gives 
us an excellent picture of the times and shows how 
bishops and abbots, here as elsewhere, conformed 
to the economic systems of their period, while all 
concede that under the abbot's jurisdiction were 
ever to be found the most ideal conditions of the 
day. 

The system here described was indeed far re- 
moved from the supreme ideals of Christian 
democracy applied to industry. Yet it was an im- 
measurable progress over the position of the 
laborer in the classic days of Rome and Greece, 
while it afforded the humble toiler a surer sub- 
sistence and a more quiet and contented life than 
he was to enjoy at a much later period under mod- 
ern capitalism. Pauperism and starvation were 
alike unknown. The lowliest worker and his fam- 
ily were always provided for and the supplies of 
the monasteries were everywhere at his command, 
should he stand in need of them. So, too, the 
beneficed clergyman was bound by canon law 
to spend on the Church or on the poor all that 



LABOR UNDER CHARLEMAGNE AND AFTER 95 

remained to him after his own proper sustentation. 
It was not the fault of the Church if he abused his 
opportunities. Even in Wolsey's favor, who 
lived at a far later period and represented the ex- 
treme of ecclesiastical ambition, Joseph Rickaby, 
S. J., writes: " It may be allowed that he spent his 
wealth nobly. And so did other great ecclesiastics 
of the age, which the plunderers of the next gen- 
eration did not. What is known at Oxford as 
4 the House ' is forever sacred to the memory of 
the Cardinal of Yorke." 

Not all German laborers were serfs in the 
early centuries here described. The number of 
free craftsmen w r as constantly increasing. There 
was also a considerable class of free farmers who 
owned the soil they tilled, as well as a number of 
free mark and village communities. Yet ordi- 
narily even these stood under the protection of 
some great lord. It must, in fact, be remembered 
here that the entire civilization of that period was 
built upon the one idea of service. The lord him- 
self was only less dependent than his serfs. It was 
the duty and the glory of each man, whether free 
or bond, high or low, to be faithful to the master 
who was over him. " I serve," could be the 
motto of the proudest lord. 

A greater freedom gradually prevailed among 
the serfs. Their service was reduced to a more 
limited number of days. It even passed from the 



96 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

individual to the trade group, which could assign 
definite members to perform in turn the custom- 
ary duties, thus always leaving a number free to 
follow their own occupations. A tax was finally 
paid in place of personal service, and so serfdom 
itself passed out of existence. 

During the course of these developments the 
groups of workmen had formed their own organiz- 
ations under the care of the Church. Every Ger- 
man gild, as Gierke remarks, was religious, social 
and moral in its purpose, besides following its own 
specific aims. Even before their emancipation 
the serfs had obtained distinct rights which their 
lords were bound to respect. With their full free- 
dom achieved they naturally betook themselves in 
ever increasing numbers into the cities, which thus 
received a great labor population. Free gilds 
sprang into existence everywhere, each with its 
own chaplain, its own altar or chapel, and its ob- 
lations of candles, its offerings for Masses, and 
its benefactions to the poor. 

It must not, however, be concluded that we must 
therefore seek the origin of the gilds in the unfree 
labor groups, organized by the Frankish lords 
upon their manors. This was but one of many 
factors which all combined to further the same 
Christian ideal. The essence of the gild was 
brotherhood, religion, mutual helpfulness and 
social fellowship among equals. Everywhere the 
same forces were at work. Everywhere the 



LABOR UNDER CHARLEMAGNE AND AFTER 97 

Church stood by, protecting, directing, leading up- 
ward to a larger freedom and a more perfect char- 
ity. 

Outside the Church violence and barbarity, sword and con- 
quest, the untamed powers of nature reigned unchecked, both 
before the time of Pepin and Charlemagne, and after them 
under their more feeble successors, and indeed long after the 
complete extinction of their race. In spite of the contempt for 
learning and culture, there existed still a deep reverence for 
religion and its ministers; in spite of strong passions, faith was 
living. Monasteries were held in high honor as abodes of 
purer life, and persons high in rank took pleasure in visiting 
them, and frequently chose them as places of retreat for the 
remainder of their lives. Discipline and sound principles could 
come from the Church alone; enlightened legislation could be 
her work alone; and under her influence alone could the con- 
ditions of society be improved. To her was due the mitigation 
and repression of slavery, the first organized care of the poor, 
the institution of the Truce of God, the establishment of places 
of education, and every true form of progress. 

Princes and people were eager to confide the weightiest 
interests to the clergy and to increase their external means of 
power and influence; for their learning and virtue they merited 
trust, and by their character and authority they were the most 
sure support of public order. The Church on her side did her 
utmost to obtain safeguards against the many attacks and acts 
of aggression of princes and nobles, who sometimes from desire 
of vengeance, oftener from mere covetousness, imprisoned 
bishops and priests, robbed them, misused them and thrust others 
into their places. 8 

It was this constant interference of the State 
with the Church, beginning with the reign of Con- 

8 Dr. Joseph Hergenrother, " Catholic Church and Christian 
State," I, pp. 256, 257. See: Ratzinger, " Geschichte der Kirch- 
lichen Armenpflege" pp. 141, ff. 



98 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

stantine, the first imperial champion of Christi- 
anity, and continuing down to our time, that has 
ever hampered her power for good, thrusting un- 
worthy prelates in high places or preventing the 
great unselfish works of zeal and piety undertaken 
by others. Yet in spite of every difficulty from 
within or from without she has steadily carried 
down the ages the torch of Christian truth that 
lights the way to all true liberty. 

And here a little digression may be of interest 
to complete the picture of this early civilization. 
No later than the year 858 we find mention made 
of gilds of priests as well as of the laity in the ca- 
pitularies of Archbishop Hincmar of Rheims. 9 
No restriction of any kind is placed upon them, ex- 
cept that they must not transgress the bounds of 
11 authority, usefulness and right reason. " Here 
therefore we have the attitude of the Church 
clearly defined at the very beginning of gild his- 
tory. When the limits thus described are fla- 
grantly transgressed, it is not only her right, but 
her duty to interfere. The salvation of souls is 
then imperiled. The social institution thus cen- 
sured has become a menace to society and religion. 

Since frequent mention is made of these gilds of 
priests that sprang up at the beginning of the Mid- 
dle Ages, and much misunderstanding exists upon 
this point, a word of explanation may well be of- 
fered. They were known by the name of Gilds of 

9 Labbei Concilia, ed. Colcti, t. x., cap. 16, p. 4. 



LABOR UNDER CHARLEMAGNE AND AFTER 99 

the Kalends, because they met on the first day of 
the Roman month, the calendae. Their purpose 
was the discussion of pastoral interests. Thus 
the clergy of certain sections would meet for divine 
service, common deliberations and the usual feast 
which was one of the essentials of every medieval 
gild. Special objects, such as the maintenance 
of schools, the preservation of documents and 
archives, were likewise kept in view. The mem- 
bers are occasionally reminded in their statutes 
that their gilds exist " not merely that they may 
derive from them present advantages and tem- 
poral gains, but rather that they may obtain 
heavenly and eternal benefits." They are admon- 
ished to take their meal becomingly and with the 
fear of God. Pious reading and singing of hymns 
are suggested. A limited number of laymen were 
admitted into these gilds at a later period; but 
their wives, in spite of frequent requests on the 
part of their husbands were excluded, until in 
1422, after many centuries, slight concessions 
were made upon this point. They were such, how- 
ever, as hardly to modify the strictness of the or- 
iginal regulations. The main feature was that the 
wives of the lay members took their turns in offer- 
ing hospitality and services to the gild. 

That in the very earliest and semi-barbarous 
times abuses occasionally occurred at the meetings 
of these gilds is evident in particular from the 
capitulary of Archbishop Hincmar (852). It is 



IOO DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

entirely unwarranted, however, to draw the con- 
clusion, as has commonly been done in a very un- 
historical way, that such happenings were the rule 
and not the exception. During the many centuries 
of the existence of these gilds only a very few ref- 
erences to excesses can be found, and these oc- 
curred at the very beginning of gild history. 
They simply serve to illustrate in a striking man- 
ner the watchfulness of the Church over her chil- 
dren and her care to correct without delay what- 
ever is evil. It is from prompt ecclesiastical repri- 
mands that we have our knowledge of these mat- 
ters. The capitularies of Archbishop Hincmar 
(852) and of Bishop Walter of Orleans (858) 
are the sources of our information. The very 
documents in question, with their sound moral les- 
sons, afford the best evidence of the high ideals 
maintained by the Church at every epoch of his- 
tory. The facts we have alluded to prove nothing 
more than that the vices and passions of the pagan 
orgies of earlier times were still a danger to the 
recently converted Catholics, and that instances oc- 
curred in which even the clergy were not free from 
blame. With the more complete infusion of the 
Catholic spirit these abuses disappeared. The in- 
cidents therefore are only another splendid wit- 
ness to the power for good which the Church has 
ever exercised in the world. 

14 The power of religious sentiment," Emerson 
says, in describing that Christianity which " like a 






LABOR UNDER CHARLEMAGNE AND AFTER 1 01 

chemistry of fire " drew a firm line between bar- 
barism and culture — " The power of religious 
sentiment put an end to human sacrifices, checked 
appetite, inspired the Crusades, inspired resistance 
to tyrants, inspired self-respect, set bounds to serf- 
dom and slavery, founded liberty, created the re- 
ligious architecture: Yorke, Newstead, Westmin- 
ster, etc. — works to which the key is lost with the 
sentiment which created them." With a reunion 
of the world in that one same Faith, as living 
to-day as in the day of the Apostles or of the 
builders of Oxford and of Chartres cathedral, can 
that golden key be found again. 



CHAPTER XI 

ORIGIN OF MEDIEVAL GILDS 

THERE is great divergence of opinion 
about the origin of the free medieval 
gilds which are next to engage our at- 
tention and wherein we shall find exemplified the 
highest conceptions of the dignity of labor and 
the truest realization hitherto attained of the dem- 
ocratic control of industry. Though apparently 
it matters little to the social student or reformer 
whether they were derived from ancient Rome or 
Greece, or sprang up from the soil itself of the 
respective European countries, under the influence 
of the Church, the question in reality is of vital 
significance. Whatever their earliest origin, it 
was the Church, as we shall see, which impressed 
upon them, and upon the civilization in the midst 
of which they developed, those marvelous Chris- 
tian characteristics which essentially distinguished 
them from every similar form of organization his- 
torians may find in Egypt, India or China, in 
Greece or Rome, and even among the barbarous 
tribes from which many of the great nations of 
modern Europe have sprung. 

It is true that long before the medieval gilds 
came into being, the Roman ofjicia opificum, or 

102 



ORIGIN OF MEDIEVAL GILDS IO3 

trade unions, had existed not merely in Rome it- 
self, but also in the ancient cities of Gaul, Britain 
and other provinces under Roman dominion. 
This civilization, however, was soon to be swept 
away, and about such unions the history of the 
centuries that immediately followed is silent. Lit- 
tle can now be learned of economic conditions dur- 
ing these submerged epochs of history except that 
slavery was again made the practice of the bar- 
barian conqueror, and the slave was deprived, as 
in the former pagan days, of every human right. 
Yet the many analogies and even possible points 
of contact existing between the ancient and the 
medieval gilds have naturally given rise to a theory 
which would see in the medieval trade unions the 
lineal descendants of the ancient labor organiza- 
tions. In the same manner the merchant gilds of 
the Middle Ages are thought to be derived from 
the trading organizations of the Romans and the 
Syrians. 

Especially interesting is the fact that in the 
East classical traditions continued unbroken at 
Constantinople, and it is not impossible that Ro- 
man gilds may there at least have survived until 
the very fall of the city, towards the end of the 
Middle Ages. Certain it is that such gilds are 
found both under the Byzantine Emperors and 
in the days of Moslem rule. Mohammed him- 
self is said to have been a member of a merchant 
gild. The tradition which makes of him the 



104 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

founder of the Esnafs, as the Turkish gilds are 
called, is accounted for by the same process which 
ascribed to Numa or to Servius Tullius the insti- 
tution of the Roman craft gilds, or which attri- 
buted to iEsop the fables that centuries before had 
been familiar to the old Egyptians. All that is 
needed is a historic nucleus. 

The Esnafs, as the gilds of Turkey and the va- 
rious Mussulman tribes are called, were not im- 
probably derived from such early institutions, and 
popular traditions made bold to trace them back 
to the days before the flood. Like the classical 
Christian gilds they acknowledged the need of re- 
ligion, but showed a true Mohammedan singular- 
ity, and at times perversity, in the choice of pa- 
trons. Thus to Adam were dedicated the gilds of 
bakers and tailors, to Noah the shipwrights and 
carpenters. Cain was the patron of the grave- 
diggers, Abel of the herdsmen and Nimrod of the 
smiths, while Mother Eve was patroness of the 
gild of washerwomen. 1 Enoch was regarded as 
the first weaver and Seth as the first button-maker 
and wool-dealer, the inventor of the shirt. 2 

Westward the course of Empire takes its way. 
Along the same path, by a finely elaborated and 
seemingly plausible theory, certain writers have 
attempted to trace the progress of the gilds. 

1 Garnett, " Turkish Life in Town and Country." 

2 Kosta NikoloflF, " Das llandwerk und Zunftwesen in Bui- 
garien" etc. 



ORIGIN OF MEDIEVAL GILDS 105 

What in fact could seem more simple than to map 
out this uninterrupted course of gild life through 
more than twenty centuries ? Beginning with the 
days of the Roman King Numa, almost seven hun- 
dred years before the Christian era, we would 
thus trace it down to Augustus; from Augustus to 
Constantine; from the first Eastern Emperor to 
the last of the Byzantine monarchs. Finally from 
Constantinople we should see it spreading through- 
out the Orient, thence passing over into Lombardy, 
from Lombardy into Southern France, and from 
France into Germany and England! 

While this may forcibly appeal to the theorist, 
there is no historic evidence to make the gilds of 
the Middle Ages essentially dependent upon those 
of other civilizations. Influences from Roman 
and Byzantine sources may undoubtedly have been 
brought to bear upon them, whether directly or 
indirectly. Yet such influences were not sufficient 
to account for a system which seemed almost to 
partake of the universality of the Catholic Church 
itself, and which differed vastly in its entire spirit 
from all other forms of gild life which had pre- 
ceded it. 

While the Roman trade-unions during the last 
centuries of the declining Empire were purely ser- 
vile organizations, and the Eastern esnafs and the 
trade castes of India remained stagnant, the gilds 
which arose under the influence of the Catholic 
Church were a dynamic force. Nowhere perhaps 



106 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

was that freedom and spirit of brotherhood, which 
the Church has come to bring to mankind, better 
illustrated than in these gilds at the period of their 
most ideal development. They were the natural 
flowering of her teachings by which alone labor 
was truly honored and sanctified. Under her in- 
spiration nobles and captains, princes and rulers 
laid aside their robes of state and shining armor 
to don the poor patched habit of the monk. To 
the great Religious Order of the Benedictines, in 
particular, as we have seen, the civilization of 
barbarous nations was due. They drained the 
marshes and cultivated the arid land; they cleared 
the forests which were still the lurking places of 
wild beasts and more savage men; they tutored the 
fierce minds of the barbarian hordes, and with 
solemn chant and # holy word raised up men's 
hearts to God. Beneath their labors the waste 
wilderness became fertile with the benediction of 
golden harvests and the desert bloomed into an 
Eden of beauty. Soon hamlet and town arose 
about the monastery wall, and God was glorified 
throughout the land. Amid such influences many 
of the gilds of the Middle Ages took their origin. 

So intimate indeed was the relation between 
the Church and organized labor, and so inter- 
fused were the religious and economic purposes 
of the labor gilds that it is almost impossible to 
classify them. " The religious element," writes 
Gross, M a potent factor in the history of gilds 



ORIGIN OF MEDIEVAL GILDS 107 

from their birth to their final extinction, is an al- 
most insurmountable obstacle to their logical clas- 
sification; for, as Wilda rightly observes, every 
gild comprehended within itself a religious one." 3 

While the relation of the gilds with the Church 
is unquestionable, both as regards their origin and 
their development, an outline must at least be 
given here of the theory which would seek to 
trace them back to the old pagan sacrificial feasts 
of the nations among whom the early missionaries 
labored. 

The old Teutonic root of the word gild has two 
distinct meanings. It signified " to pay " and also 
14 to sacrifice." The word, therefore, in its first 
meaning, might readily have been derived from 
the contributions, or " payments," which have al- 
ways been an essential part of the gild statutes in 
every age. Geld in German still retains this root 
meaning, and is the exact equivalent of our mod- 
ern English word " money " for the Anglo-Saxon 
gild. 

Writers, however, who insist mainly upon the 
sacrificial character of the first gilds naturally ac- 
cept only the derivation which confirms their own 
theory. According to Brentano, one of the fore- 
most champions of this view, gild meant originally 
the sacrificial meal made up of common contribu- 
tions; then a social banquet in general; and lastly 
a society. 

3 Charles Gross, " The Gild Merchant," I, p. 176. 



108 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

Christianity — to sum up this theory in brief — 
had not come to banish the cheer of life, but to 
hallow it. The old feasts were therefore still 
retained as paganism gradually disappeared. But 
Christ was worshiped and His saints were hon- 
ored in place of the idolatrous homage which had 
once prevailed. The banquets formerly held in 
connection with superstitious sacrifices were now 
opened with Christian prayers. The virtues of 
the Gospel expelled the vices of the pagan orgies. 
The Church in fine retained, and elevated to a 
higher sphere, whatever elements of brotherhood 
and mutual helpfulness had already existed under 
the old worship of the false gods. 

Such an argument may appear plausible. Yet 
here likewise there is no evidence which forces us 
to accept it. The banquets which were to become 
so striking a feature of the Christian gilds had 
already existed in the gilds of Rome and Greece. 
With a different spirit they reappeared in the love 
feasts of apostolic days. They were the natural 
expression of man's social nature, and like all other 
indifferent actions could be supernaturalized by 
religious motives. While instituted for manifold 
and specifically various purposes, the medieval 
gilds were invariably social and religious. Hence 
they naturally delighted in conviviality, without 
forgetting the public as well as private duties of 
worship. 



ORIGIN OF MEDIEVAL GILDS IO9 

Wilda, 4 one of the earliest authorities upon this 
subject and a foremost defender of the dual origin 
of the gilds, attributes them both to the heathen 
banquets and to the later influence of the Church. 
Gross, who takes issue with him upon the first 
part of this theory, fully admits the importance 
of the second. " However erroneous," he writes, 
" Wilda's theories may be in detail, he is doubt- 
less right in ascribing to Christianity a prominent 
part in the inception of the gilds." The Chris- 
tianity of those days was nothing else than the 
Catholic Church, the same in her teaching as we 
know her to-day. 

After what has already been said we can dis- 
pense ourselves from entering into the evolution- 
ary theories which deduce the gilds from the fam- 
ily. While admitting freely the possibility of 
many and various modifying influences, such as 
we have here described, it is sufficient to recur to 
the needs of human nature and the principles of 
Christianity as the chief sources from which sprang 
the medieval gilds. 

4 W. E. Wilda, "Das Gildenwesen im Mittelalter." 



CHAPTER XII 

MERCHANT GILDS 

ANEW epoch in the history of labor opens 
with the merchant gilds. Seen in their 
best aspect, they are the first approach 
towards an adequate expression of industrial de- 
mocracy that the world had known. To appre- 
ciate the progress implied in these early " town 
gilds " we need but cast a single glance backward 
into the past. 

Far in the distance lies the arid waste of an- 
cient paganism. In the famous cities of classical 
antiquity the oppression of labor reached its height 
amid the culmination of art and wealth, while the 
fair countrysides, that once had been held as the 
possession of sturdy freeman, were filled with 
gruesome prison dens whence the branded slaves 
went forth to toil beneath the lash and till for 
heartless Roman masters the earth that God had 
made for all alike. In such a world was sown 
the great doctrine of human brotherhood. Jud- 
aism had never been able to practise it perfectly. 
Christianity realized it for the first time within its 
own early community. But bitter and ceaseless 
to the end was the Church's struggle with Ro- 
man vice and heartlessness and greed, though 

no 



MERCHANT GILDS III 

great and many were the saints she reared. Then 
came the hurricane of the barbarian invasion lay- 
ing waste all the earth. One institution alone re- 
mained. It was that same Church of Christ 
which had sought to Christianize the Roman as it 
now labored to convert and civilize the rude 
hordes that fell upon him as the scourge of God. 

Again amid the new paganism of the barbarian 
conquerors sprang up the beauty of the Gospel 
teachings of human brotherhood and the Father- 
hood of an all-loving God. The fierce and bloody 
Wotan disappeared before the fair Christ, born 
of the lowly virgin and reared in the humble car- 
penter's shop, Himself the Carpenter of Nazareth. 
No wonder that with the growing power of the 
Church labor too should rise into dignity, should 
develop its new-found freedom and should finally 
attain to the perfection of industrial democracy in 
the days when the great Catholic gilds were at 
length to reach the summit of their usefulness. 

With the gilda mercatoria — as the first of the 
new institutions we are now to study was called in 
the Latin documents of the day — the economic 
chapter of the medieval labor associations prop- 
erly begins. Variously known as the gild mer- 
chant, merchant gild or town gild, this organiza- 
tion is peculiarly interesting to us from many 
points of view. It appeals alike to the historian, 
the lawyer, the social worker, the inquirer into 
the origin of corporations, the student of munici- 



112 



DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 



pal government or popular civic activities, and to 
all who are following the momentous develop- 
ment of economic organizations in our day. 
Previous societies had been exclusively civic, social 
and religious in their scope. The new institution 
embraced all these purposes, although it was pre- 
dominantly commercial in its nature. 

No trace of any merchant gild can be found 
previous to the records of the Norman Conquest 
in England. It was in this country that it re- 
ceived its most complete development and exer- 
cised a greater influence than in Germany, France 
or any other European land. A reason for this 
fact may not improbably have been the compara- 
tively late expansion of industry in England, which 
made commercial intercourse with the continent 
peculiarly necessary. Even in the Anglo-Saxon 
days the merchant who thrice crossed the ocean 
was raised to the dignity of a thane. 

Whatever cause we may assign, it is certain 
that with the Norman Conquest a new era of com- 
mercial and industrial expansion opened up for 
England. Not only was foreign trade stim- 
ulated by the close relation of the Norman mer- 
chant with the continent, but a new impulse was 
given to domestic trade and industry. Probably 
the first clear reference to a merchant gild is found 
in a charter granted to the burgesses of Burford 
by Robert Fitz-Hamon (1087-1107). 

The name given to the particular form of asso- 



MERCHANT GILDS 113 

ciation which we are here considering is apt to 
prove misleading to the modern reader. The 
term " merchant gild " only vaguely implies the 
meaning it would convey to-day. It was in reality 
a labor gild. Each craftsman, at this period, was 
likewise a merchant. He personally manufac- 
tured his wares and personally sold them in the 
market, at the fair, or in his own shop and home. 
He not only directly purchased the raw material 
of his trade, but at times even bartered with it. 
Thus the brewers of Hamburg are said to have 
been the principal corn merchants of their city. 
Similar instances might readily be given in illus- 
tration from English history. 

All the burgesses, or citizens, of these primitive 
communities could therefore be members of the 
merchant gild of their respective town or borough. 
Since, however, the possession of a burgage — the 
ownership of a town lot, apparently with or with- 
out a tenement, according to different regulations 
— was in some instances at least required for the 
right of citizenship and of the ballot, there would 
necessarily be many who could not fulfil this con- 
dition. Others again were not strictly resident 
inhabitants, while lastly there was a large unfree 
population, known from this time on as villeins. 
In many boroughs members of all these grades 
could enter the gild. Special clauses in favor of 
villeins were even to be found in not a few in- 
stances. The exclusiveness of later gilds became 



H4 



DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 



more absolute as the town population grew, and 
the gradual emancipation of the unfree classes 
filled the cities with men who were often almost 
on a footing with the free burghers, although still 
in a nominal state of villeinage. 

The merchant gilds were a protection against 
the feudal lord, and the bondman who had fled 
from the land was to be recognized as a freeman 
after he had lived in the town a year and a day. 
This certainly applied where he held land, paying 
" scot and lot." But even before the expiration 
of that time he could be a member of the gild. 
It is evident therefore how the spirit of industrial 
democracy was gradually developed by these free 
institutions. 

In illustration we may quote the answer made 
by the mayor and community of Bedford to the 
crown attorney who by royal authority had asked 
to know what inhabitants were admitted into their 
Merchant Gild. " Both burgesses (i.e., citizens) 
of the town," they replied, " and any others dwell- 
ing in the same, from the time that they take the 
oath to preserve the liberties of the town and the 
king's peace and to maintain all other privileges 
touching the aforesaid town and gild, are ad- 
mitted into the gild, so that they can then sell all 
kinds of merchandise by retail, and everywhere 
enjoy the aforesaid immunities and liberties, just 
as the burgesses themselves." ! It is evident, 

1 Gross, " The Gild Merchant/' I, p. 38. 



MERCHA.NT GILDS 115 

therefore, that citizenship and gildship were not 
synonymous, as has often been assumed. 

The specific object of the merchant gild is 
likewise clearly defined in this quotation. It is 
briefly expressed in the words, " so that they can 
then sell all kinds of merchandise by retail." 
While a certain liberty was allowed to foreign 
merchants in disposing of their goods by whole- 
sale in so far as this could not harm domestic 
trade, no one except a gildsman might in general 
deal in retail merchandise without being subject to 
tolls from which the members of the gild were 
free. The sale of certain products was moreover 
strictly a gild monopoly. It is probable however 
that the necessaries of life were not ordinarily 
subject to such restrictions. 

" No one shall buy anything in the town of 
Southampton, to sell again in the same town," 
reads a local gild statute, " unless he be of the 
Gild Merchant, or of the franchise; and if any one 
does it and is found guilty, all that he has thus 
bought shall be forfeited to the King." 2 Even 
in making purchases the gild merchant of this 
town was to take precedence over all others who 
might wish to buy : 

And no simple inhabitant nor stranger shall bargain for nor 
buy any kind of merchandise coming to the town before bur- 
gesses of the Gild Merchant, so long as a gildsman is present 
and wishes to bargain for or buy it; and if any one does it 

2 Ibid., p. 46. 



I l6 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

and is found guilty, that which he buys shall be forfeited to the 
King. 3 

Thus we read that the abbot of Buckfastleigh, 
to enjoy the gild privileges of purchase, entered 
into the following agreement with the citizens of 
Totnes about the year 1235: " That the said 
burgesses receive the said abbot and monks into 
the gild merchant, i. e., that they be allowed to 
make all purchases like other burgesses, excepting 
all sales in the name of trade." For this privi- 
lege a yearly tollage was paid by the abbot. 

To judge fairly of these regulations we must 
bear in mind that, at least in their best period, the 
English merchant gilds were generally open to ev- 
ery merchant and craftsman in the town. Even 
foreign merchants not belonging to the gild might 
sell their wares at the great fairs and on market 
days, when the main purchases of the year were 
made. Merchants of neighboring towns might 
moreover receive the liberty of the gild, and an 
interchange of privileges took place. In some 
charters express mention is made of freedom from 
toll throughout the realm. It is even believed that 
this was a general privilege of the merchant gilds. 

In every case strict provision was made in the 
royal charter, or by the town authorities, to pro- 
tect the gildsmen from the unlicensed competition 
of non-members or foreigners. The latter title 
was applied to all who were not townsmen. The 

3 Southampton Gild, A. D. 1327. 



MERCHANT GILDS 117 

isolation of the individual boroughs, the dangers 
often encountered in passing from one to the 
other, made the separation between town and 
town perhaps as great as that which now exists 
between country and country. Every stranger, 
though coming from the nearest city, was a " for- 
eigner." The gildsmen therefore could not per- 
mit him to carry away at pleasure the wealth of 
the little community. Many exceptions, as we 
have already seen, were made in this medieval pro- 
tective system. 

The retail selling of merchandise by non-gilds- 
men was forbidden, not only within the borough, 
but likewise within the immediate neighborhood, 
so that there might be no possibility of circumvent- 
ing the law. Thus the charter given by Henry II 
to Oxford lays stress upon the privilege of the 
merchant gild, " so that no one who is not of the 
gild shall presume to deal in merchandise either 
within the city or in the suburbs." 4 Frequently 
only certain classes of articles are specified as sub- 
ject to such restrictions. 

Although the merchant gilds were therefore, in 
a wide sense, trading monopolies, they cannot 
even remotely be compared with the monopolies 
of our day, or with any that have sprung up since 
the Reformation. They are essentially different. 
This is at once evident from the fact that so far 
from seeking to bring about a concentration of 

4 Stubbs, " Select Charters," 167. 



I I 8 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

trade in the hands of a few their object was to 
embrace all who could be considered merchants 
in any sense of the word, including the craftsmen 
of the town who formed the overwhelmingly great 
majority of the original membership. 

If, nevertheless, there always remained a num- 
ber who were not members of the gild, and con- 
sequently were excluded from its public privileges, 
the reason is not difficult to see. It was upon the 
gildsmen, even though not citizens, that a large 
portion of the burden of taxation fell. They 
therefore demanded likewise the advantage of 
special privileges not to be accorded to strangers 
and others who had no share in paying the munici- 
pal expenses and answering the royal obligations 
placed upon the town. Such a demand was justi- 
fied, provided it was not carried to excess. The 
first duty of the gildsmen was to pay scot and lot. 
This implied that they were to be assessed in pro- 
portionate shares whenever money was required 
not only for public improvements, but likewise to 
meet the exactions of the king. In the latter case 
particularly, there was question of forfeiting the 
dearly bought and jealously guarded franchises of 
the town itself, should they fail in their duties. 
The merchant gild therefore was the last re- 
source and the great strength of the municipalities 
with which it was identified. The town devel- 
oped and prospered along with it. Not only did 
the gild pay the imposed taxes, but it often under- 



MERCHA.NT GILDS 119 

took considerable works for the common good. 
The municipal welfare and the unsullied reputa- 
tion of its borough was the main concern of the 
merchant gild, 

That there were likewise serious disadvantages 
to be dreaded from excessive protection, and from 
abuses of power, leading to selfishness, need not 
be insisted upon. Like all purely human institu- 
tions, the merchant gilds had their defective side 
due to mere misjudgment, to faulty social cus- 
toms and traditions not yet cast aside, or to other 
human frailties. Even in the most ideal earthly 
state we shall never be able to ignore the fact of 
the original fall. Civic injustice and domestic 
grievances will, to a greater or less extent, always 
crop up anew owing to human selfishness. Re- 
ligion alone can successfully attack this evil at its 
root. 

Another vital difference between the merchant 
gild and modern monopoly lies in the fact that the 
right of the consumer was constantly kept in sight. 
The object of the gild was to set a fair price 
which should be neither exorbitant for the pur- 
chaser nor unjust for the tradesman. All traf- 
ficking above or below this just standard was cer- 
tain to bring severe penalties upon the offenders. 
Heavy fines moreover were imposed for all dis- 
honesty in weight, measure or quantity. The nu- 
merous records which remain show that these laws 
were duly enforced. Here indeed is one of the 



120 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

first demands made upon the producer in any 
system of industrial democracy worthy of the 
name. Both profits and wages must be kept 
within a reasonable limit that will effectively ward 
off from the consumer the menace of a high cost 
of living. 

Lastly, all monopoly, such as the term implies 
at present, was not only strictly forbidden, but 
stringent regulations were drawn up to make it 
impossible. No individual or group of individ- 
uals could monopolize any product. Attempts to 
buy up goods, not indeed to control the market — 
an offense so heinous that it was utterly unimag- 
inable to the mind of the medieval gildsman — 
but to conduct a larger sale than was possible to 
others, was likely to meet with instant and abso- 
lute confiscation of the goods purchased for this 
purpose. The genius of the individual was to 
manifest itself, not by accumulating a vast fortune 
and by employing the greatest number of men, but 
by producing the most perfect article for the mar- 
ket. Each gildsman was to earn an honest in- 
come. No one was to monopolize or even par- 
tially control any industry. 

While therefore under the later system of op- 
pressive individualism the merchant gilds were 
naturally condemned as destructive of free compe- 
tition, and we may readily concede that their pro- 
tective measures may at times seem irksome and ex- 
cessive, they nevertheless prevented the far greater 






MERCHANT GILDS 121 

evils that were to follow under capitalism. These 
truths are being admitted more freely every day. 
fi*&e» Mr. Henry C. Vedder, Professor of Church 
History in Crozier Theological Semir^rv, con- 
fesses no less in a volume written A no-vory yoa j- of 
t lii rot f b— afe o f»the world war* I a t e a<ryT f 

The despised Middle Ages were in many respects, marked by 
a social justice superior to our own. Society then tried to pre- 
vent unfair competition, to give every man a chance in his own 
rank. Rising capitalism was from the beginning impatient of 
all such restraints, and insisted that they should be removed, 
so that competition might be made free and every man find his 
level. It proved strong enough to carry its point; restraints 
were removed; competition was without limit. What followed? 
We have but to look about us and see. 5 

The three great commercial vices against which 
the merchant gild statutes are directed were then 
known as " forestalling " or buying articles be- 
fore they could be offered in the open market on 
equal terms to all gildsmen; " engrossing," or 
making large-scale purchases in order to corner 
any product; and lastly " regrating," or buying 
goods in order to retail them above the market 
price. The main objection which can be urged 
against the merchant gilds is the discrimination 
against the non-gildsman, the reason for which we 
have already explained. The civic and national 
responsibilities and burdens as well as the com- 
mercial privileges were equally the share of the 

5 " The Gospel of Jesus and the Problems of Democracy," p. 

72. 



122 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

gildsman, who was ordinarily a laborer, practising 
his trade and selling his ware upon the market. 
The non-gildsmen, in the beginning, were mainly, 
as would appear, the half-free population of the 
towns whose condition the Rev. J. Malet Lambert, 
a Protestant divine, holds: " Was in many re- 
spects as prosperous, compared with the rest of 
the population, as that of the artisan class of the 
present day." 6 We are dealing here with a stage 
of social development which was the historic 
status of the time, and which, under the influence 
of the Church, was constantly developing into a 
more perfect form of industrial democracy. 

A word must here be said of the gild officials. 
According to the various constitutions each organ- 
ization was usually presided over by an alderman, 
steward or master, assisted by two or four war- 
dens or echevins. Sometimes two officials were at 
the head of the gild. Other special officers were 
appointed for particular functions, such as provost, 
sergeant and bailiffs. In later times there existed 
a council of twelve or twenty-four members who 
were most influential in the control of the organ- 
ization. The meetings were known as " morning- 
talks, " and often were simply called " gilds. " 
Social conviviality was of course indispensable for 
the public gatherings of the gildsmen. 

Religion, charity and good fellowship were all 
carefully provided for within the merchant gild. 

• " Two Thousand Years of Gild Life," p. 88. 



MERCHANT GILDS 1 23 

Regulations regarding the appointment of a chap- 
lain, the offering of candles for altar and shrine, 
the celebration of Masses for the intentions of the 
gild, the prayers for departed souls and similar 
ordinances were carefully drawn up and every gild 
was dedicated to a patron Saint. Sick members 
were to be visited, those who had fallen into pov- 
erty were to be relieved, and daughters dowered 
for the wedded life or for the convent. Banquets 
played an important part and often were held on 
the occasion of business meetings. Even the sick 
gildsmen who could not attend were remembered, 
and special portions were set aside and sent to 
them. So too, according to statute ten of the 
Southampton merchant gild: 

If a gildsman was in prison in any place in England, in time 
of peace, the alderman, with the seneschal and one of the 
echevins, should go at the cost of the gild to procure his de- 
liverance. If any gildsman strike another with his fist and be 
thereof attained, he should lose his gildship, but might regain the 
same for 10s. and a new oath. A stranger (with gild privi- 
leges) striking a gildsman, to lose his privileges of the gild and 
go to prison for a day and night; a stranger not of the gild 
so offending, to be imprisoned (since he had no gild privileges 
to lose) two days and nights. A gildsman reviling or aspersing 
another gildsman to be fined 2s., or in default lose his gildship. 7 

Where there is question of delivering or de- 
fending a gildsman his innocence is presumed, since 
gild regulations do not shield the guilty, nor is im- 
punity given to the gildsmen against non-members, 

7 Cornelius Walford, "Gilds," p. 116. 



124 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

unless a gild should be in its decline, religiously 
and socially. 

What at first glance must strike the reader is 
the extensive civic power delegated to the mer- 
chant gilds. So great was their influence at times 
that the impression has been created that not in- 
frequently the entire control of the municipal gov- 
ernment rested with the town gild. Whatever 
may be said of various continental gilds it is certain 
that the English merchant gild was dependent, as 
such organizations should be, upon the civil au- 
thorities and had its vast powers duly delegated 
from them or even directly from the King himself. 
The early city charters usually embodied the priv- 
ilege of establishing such a gild, a privilege eag- 
erly coveted by them, since not only the prosperity 
of the city but even the development of its consti- 
tution was greatly determined by gild influence. 
The very establishment of a merchant gild was of 
such significance that legal writers have commonly 
mistaken it to have been equivalent to municipal 
incorporation. Such therefore was the status of 
this important institution during its most flourish- 
ing period, in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries. 



CHAPTER XIII 

A SCOTCH MERCHANT GILD 

IN the name of the Lord God, and of the indi- 
visible Trinity, and of the Blessed Virgin 
Mary, and of all the Saints, these are the 
statutes of the Burghers' Gild. Such is the brief 
but solemn introduction to the code of ordinances 
drawn up for their merchant gild by the citizens of 
Berwick-upon-Tweed. Their regulations will ad- 
mirably serve us as an illustration of the varied 
interests of these ancient town gilds. 

The earliest documentary reference to the 
Scotch gildry dates back to the reign of David I 
(1124-1153). From that period onward the 
gild idea continued to develop. It took its most 
definite form in the burgh of Berwick, which was a 
Scotch town until the fourteenth century. Pre- 
vious to the year 1283 several gilds had coexisted 
there until the gildsmen conceived the plan of 
uniting them into one corporate organization. 
11 So that/' reads the gild preamble, " where 
many bodies are found side by side in one place, 
they may become one and have one will, and in 
the dealings of one towards another have a strong 
and hearty love." The new association thus 
formed was a merchant gild. 

125 



126 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

The ordinances, we are told, were drawn up by 
the burghers in the course of two days' delibera- 
tions in the year 1283, and three days' delibera- 
tions in the year following. They had probably 
been drafted previously by individuals or com- 
mittees, who doubtlessly took into consideration 
many earlier gild regulations. The body of 
statutes thus approved became a model for sub- 
sequent Scotch merchant gilds in other towns. 
They were in fact of such importance that they 
were admitted into the early collections of the 
burghal laws, and may be found in this connec- 
tion in the work of Cosmo Innes, " Ancient Laws 
and Customs of the Burghs of Scotland." * In 
our study of this interesting subject, we shall use 
the translation given in his documentary work on 
14 English Gilds " by Toulmin Smith. 2 

44 All separate gilds," the first statute ordains, 
" heretofore existing in the borough, shall be 
brought to an end. The goods rightfully belong- 
ing to them shall be handed over to this gild. No 
other gild shall be allowed in the borough. All 
shall be as members having one head, one in 
counsel, one body, strong and friendly." We 
have here in this ideal a reflection of the one su- 
preme reality in the minds of the gildsmen, the 
unity of head and members in the Catholic 
Church. The economic object was to eliminate 

1 1, pp. 64-88. 

2 See also Thorpe, " Diplomatarium Angl.," pp. 605-617. 



A SCOTCH MERCHANT GILD 1 27 

destructive competition among the various gilds, 
whose members evidently agreed to unite their in- 
terests and combine their treasuries. Yet there 
was no question of a monopoly in the hands of a 
few wealthy merchants. 

In the ordinances which follow it is often easy 
to perceive the influence of Catholicity in the spirit 
of charity and brotherhood displayed, in the con- 
sideration taken of the common good of the com- 
munity, and in the generous concern for the spirit- 
ual welfare of the members. It would be unjust 
on the other hand to hold the Church accountable 
for such imperfections and faults as may exist in 
this or any other gild system. They are due to 
the shortcomings of human nature and the miscon- 
ceptions or selfishness of individuals, against 
which her voice is constantly raised. 

Continuing our reading of the statutes, we find 
that gild brethren making a will are obliged to 
bequeath a portion of their possessions to the gild, 
thus providing for the common good of the city 
and of their fellow members. Women likewise 
were admitted into the gild, as we may judge from 
the eighth statute, which places the entrance fee 
at not less than forty shillings, but exempts from 
this payment " the sons and daughters of gilds- 
men." If ever the entrance fees of gilds became 
prohibitive for the general public they had lost 
their democratic character. 

The observance of the Christian law of charity 



128 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

is duly provided for, first in the mutual respect the 
brethren are to show each other. Foul words 
spoken to a gild brother " going to, at, or coming 
back from the gild meeting n are punishable by a 
monetary fine. Poverty and human infirmities are 
carefully relieved. " Whoever shall fall into old 
age or poverty, or into hopeless sickness, and has 
no means of his own, shall have such help as the 
aldermen, dean and brethren of the gild think 
right, and such as the means of the gild enable to 
be given." So too, whoever dies without leaving 
means enough to pay for- becoming burial rites 
11 shall be buried at the cost of the gild." He 
was thus receiving the honors of the gild and not 
a pauper funeral. What was of even greater im- 
portance, his family was not forgotten. " If any 
brother die, leaving a daughter true and worthy 
and of good repute, but undowered, the gild shall 
find her a dower, either in marriage, or in going 
into a religious house." 

Charity, however, was to be tempered by jus- 
tice. Thus if a brother was charged with serious 
wrong-doing he was to be helped by three of the 
gildsmen, and even the charges of the litigation 
were for a time to be borne by the gild. But " if 
the brother has been rightly charged," continues 
the twelfth statute, " he shall be dealt with as the 
aldermen and brethren think well." 

The gild likewise took the place of a modern 
board of health. Thus it kept up " a proper place 



A SCOTCH MERCHANT GILD 1 29 

for lepers " outside of the town, and saw to it 
that fitting alms were bestowed upon them. But, 
if a leper wilfully forced his way into the borough, 
thus endangering the city, he met with a some- 
what primitive punishment, but no bodily violence 
was done to him. Another important sanitary 
measure, which modern municipalities might profit- 
ably imitate, was to prevent all unsightly and pol- 
luting heaps of rubbish of whatever kind from 
being piled along the fair banks of the Tweed. 
Marks were set within which this gild law was 
strictly enforced under penalty of a fine. An- 
other statute intended for the common welfare 
of the citizens was to oblige each burgher whose 
fortune was at least forty pounds to keep a horse 
worth twenty shillings. If it died he was to pro- 
cure another within forty days, or pay a fine of 
eight shillings sterling. Judging from the statutes 
of a similar English gild it would appear that the 
purpose may have been to use the horses for draw- 
ing water in case of fire, and probably likewise for 
other civic emergencies and the defense of the 
town. 

In imposing its obligations, the gild, as is evi- 
dent, did not confine itself to its own members. 
Its charter enabled it to enforce its statutes 
throughout the entire burghal community. Thus 
it could ordain, for the sake of peace, that " No 
burgess shall get an outsider to plead for him 
against a neighbor, under penalty of a cask of 



130 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

wine." The purely economic regulations of the 
gild show best how far-reaching its power was. 

Unemployment was to be carefully avoided. 
So, to keep the town millers in work, the nine- 
teenth statute ordains : " No one shall grind 
wheat or other grain in hand-mills unless through 
urgent need. The miller must have his share, — 
the thirteenth part for grain and the twenty-fourth 
part for malt." In the same manner the butcher 
is not to deal in wool or hides, " unless he would 
abjure his ax and not lay hands upon beasts." He 
is to carry on his own trade and not interfere with 
the trade of another man. The price, however, 
of the meat is fixed for the different seasons. 
11 Mutton shall not be sold from Easter to Whit- 
suntide at dearer than sixteen pence the carcass, 
from Whitsuntide to the feast of St. James at 
dearer than twelve pence, thence to Michaelmas 
at dearer than ten pence, thence to Easter at 
dearer than eight pence. Whoever breaks this 
assize shall pay a fine of eight shillings." In the 
same way the price of ale was graded, and the 
ale-wives were to be registered. 

Very little is said expressly of gild monopoly. 
Statute twenty is an exception: "No one, not 
being a brother of the gild, shall buy wool, hides 
or skins to sell again, or shall cut cloths, save 
stranger-merchants in course of trade." 

Most important, however, are the regulations 
drawn up in order to prevent any individual from 



A SCOTCH MERCHANT GILD 131 

acquiring excessive wealth, or from controlling 
even the smallest section of the market. 

Any brother of the gild advancing money to a stranger-mer- 
chant, and sharing profits thereon, shall be fined forty shillings 
the first, the second and the third time. If it be done a fourth 
time he shall be put out of the gild. And in the same way shall 
any brother be punished who takes money from a stranger-mer- 
chant for such kind of trade. 

Married women could not buy wool, since the 
husband would thus be able to carry a double stock. 
For the same reason it was ordained that no citi- 
zen could have more than one buyer of wool and 
hides. The fine for thus attempting to create a 
little private corner was very severe. " Whoso- 
ever unreasonably ingrosses such goods out of the 
market shall forfeit them to the gild, and pay a fine 
of eight shillings." 

No one was to be able to buy up more than a 
limited amount of raw material to carry on his 
trade. In this way no one could deprive others of 
their opportunities. " No woman shall buy (at 
one time) more than a chaldron of oats for mak- 
ing beer to sell." So again, " No one shall have 
more than two pair of mill-stones." Live and let 
live, was the rule. If more labor was required in 
such a method of production there was likewise 
far more joy in the performance of the work. 
Methods of production, we must remember, were 
far different from those employed to-day. 

Particularly interesting are the regulations 



132 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

which made the sharing of large purchases an 
obligation in this as in other early gilds. " Who- 
ever buys a lot of herrings shall share them, at 
cost price, with the neighbors present at the buy- 
ing. Any one not present and wanting some shall 
pay to the buyer twelve pence profit." To pre- 
vent such sharing from becoming excessive an- 
other statute ordains that, " No brother of the 
gild ought to go shares with another in less than 
a half quarter of skins, half a dicker of hides, and 
two stones of wool." 

Of greatest importance, however, are the pro- 
visions made for the common good of all the citi- 
zens. Thus forestalling the market is guarded 
against in every way. The goods brought by 
trading vessels, and all " sea-borne articles of 
food M in particular, are to be sold only at a cer- 
tain place or under certain conditions, to give all 
an equal opportunity of making a fair purchase, 
and prevent large purchases by individuals. So 
likewise in regard to all goods brought into the 
city, the consumer is to have the first choice, and 
only at a given signal can the middleman buy the 
remaining articles. u No huckster shall buy fish, 
hay, oats, cheese, butter, or any things sent to the 
borough for sale, before the stroke of the bell in 
the bell-tower of Berefrid. If any one does this, 
the goods shall be seized, and shall be given to 
the poor." To prevent, however, the possibility 



A SCOTCH MERCHANT GILD 133 

of any one buying up the goods on the farm before 
they are brought into the town, or while still on 
their way to the town, in order to sell them at a 
profit and raise the price for the consumer, the 
prudent rule is made: " Goods shall not be 
bought up before they reach the market. Goods 
so bought up shall be forfeited to the gild." 

These last ordinances in particular we would 
recommend to all sociological students for their 
most careful consideration. There is a world of 
economic wisdom contained in them. After al- 
most a thousand years we are again making our 
own blundering attempts at what the old gilds- 
men had solved so satisfactorily. We need above 
all things to devise methods — suited to our times 
and conditions — of cheaply conveying the farm 
products and other articles directly into the city 
and to the market, so as to give the producer the 
full value of his labor and the purchaser the full 
value of his money. Protected by such provisions 
men will more willingly return to the farm, and 
the problem of the high cost of living will find its 
solution — a solution which can be rendered fu- 
tile only by the excesses in which modern society 
indulges. A key to the solution is the system of 
cooperation. 

Attention is here called to the special chapter 
on the middleman in the author's volume, u The 
World Problem," in which the system of the mer- 



134 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

chant gilds is contrasted with the modern waste- 
ful methods. 3 There is no question of simply re- 
storing the ancient gilds and blindly copying their 
methods, but of adapting to our own economic 
needs the excellent principles, more or less wisely 
applied in the various medieval gilds, accordingly 
as the spirit of the Church was able to exert its 
influence. As Mr. E. T. Raymond says: 

No sensible person will hold that the days of the gilds and 
the monasteries were the days of a terrestrial paradise. Nobody 
but a fool would want to go back to the precise ways of those 
times, any more than a grown person would care to put on a 
child's jersey and knickerbockers. The point about the Middle 
Ages is that they did represent vigorous childhood. . . . They 
were not perfect, but they had nobility, and held the germ of 
still nobler things. 4 

It is with the aid of the principles suggested 
to us by the medieval gilds and in the light of 
their experiences that the modern social order 
must be reconstructed if it is ever to be safely and 
sanely established for the procuring of the com- 
mon good. 

3 Husslein, " The World Problem/' pp. 65-74. See also chap- 
ters on cooperation: xviii, xix, and xx. The question of cooper- 
ation is still more fully developed in the concluding chapters of 
ihe present volume. 

4 Everyman, 



CHAPTER XIV 

ECONOMICS, RELIGION AND CHARITY 

WHATEVER defects and faults may be 
ascribed to the merchant gild system, 
it ever sacredly maintained the great 
truth, that religion concerns the whole man, and 
that it may not be disregarded by him in his eco- 
nomic, social and civic activities. Religion is far 
more than " a private matter," as the old gildsmen 
well realized. It determines the principles that 
actuate men in their commercial and industrial re- 
lations. With religion removed, there can be no 
authority to make them seek truth, justice and 
charity in all their dealings with their fellow-men. 
Merchant gilds were less noted than trade gilds 
for ordinances of a religious character. Exam- 
ples chosen from them will, therefore, be all the 
more convincing. They will, likewise, serve to 
illustrate the relation between religion and social 
works. The large body of craftsmen and mer- 
chants who constituted these organizations seem, 
in particular, to have had a very special devotion 
to the Mystery of the Holy Trinity. To this, in 
fact, many of the merchant gilds were dedicated. 
We shall confine ourselves in the present chapter 

135 



136 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

to two such associations, one at Lynn, dedicated 
to this great Mystery; the other at Coventry, with 
the Assumption of Our Lady for its patronal 
feast. 

The organization at Lynn dated back to a pe- 
riod prior to the reign of King John; but it was 
this monarch who granted it by letters patent the 
privilege of a recognized merchant gild. Its al- 
derman was second only to the mayor in civic 
importance, and no great municipal work was ever 
undertaken to which it did not liberally contribute 
out of its own private funds. The spacious gild- 
hall which it erected in the center of the market 
place gave distinction to the town. Particularly 
intimate was the cooperation between its officials 
and the Bishop. 1 

If now we consider the organization on its 
spiritual side, we find it no less magnificently pro- 
vided for. The two sources of information in 
our possession are the statutes and other ordi- 
nances of the gild, and an inventory made at the 
demand of King Richard II. According to the 
latter, the gild, out of the income of its lands, 
goods, chattels and bequests, actually supported 
thirteen chaplains. Six of these officiated in the 
church of St. Margaret, four in the chapel of St. 
Nicholas and three in the chapel of St. James. 
They were to celebrate Mass daily, and to pray 

1 Richards, " History of Lynn," pp. 458-466 ; Gross, " The 
Gild Merchant," II,*pp. 151-170. Harrod. 



ECONOMICS, RELIGION AND CHARITY 1 37 

for the intentions of the gild. Never perhaps, 
except in apostolic days, did men appreciate more 
highly the value of the Holy Sacrifice. Among 
the items enumerated in its list of possessions, are 
" many books, vestments, chalices, and other or- 
naments for the chaplains of the said gild." Fur- 
ther items of expense were the " wax for lights 
in the said church and chapels, in the honor and 
laud of the Holy Trinity " and " torches at the 
funerals of poor brethren, and so on." If any 
one of the chaplains should ever fail to give the 
edification which men might rightfully expect of 
him, the gild provided that he should be removed, 
and another, " able and honest," should be ap- 
pointed in his place. The souls of the gildsmen 
were thus assured of every possible spiritual bene- 
fit and assistance. The zeal of the chaplains was 
not, of course, to be limited by the duties here 
described, and even their prayers, according to 
gild ordinances, were, in particular, to secure 
the welfare of the entire Kingdom. 

The additional usages and customs of the gild 
indicate the care taken to give instant relief to 
the soul of a departed gildsman that it might ob- 
tain as soon as possible the remission of its tem- 
poral punishment and enjoy the eternal vision 
of God. Immediately upon the death of a 
brother, the custom prescribes that: 

The alderman shall order solemn Mass to be celebrated for 
him, at which every brother of the said gild that is in town, 



138 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

shall make his offering; and further the alderman shall have 
every chaplain of the said gild, immediately on the death of any 
brother, to say thirty Masses for the deceased. 

The works of charity performed by the gild 
were in proportion to its religious fervor. Out 
of the profits derived from the gild possessions of 
many kinds, liberal alms were yearly given : 

Towards the support of the poor brethren of the same gild, to 
the blind, lame and other distressed persons, to poor clerks keep- 
ing school, and poor religious houses as well of men as of 
women, to the lepers in and about Lenne, and in the repairs 
and so forth of the parish church and chapels aforesaid, and in 
the ornaments of the same, together with the alms given to the 
four orders of friars in Lenne, and to the maintaining of sev- 
eral aqueducts for the use of said town. 

Such is the testimony of the writ of inquiry made 
in the reign of Richard II. 

The gildsman, himself, was assured his support 
no matter what fortune might befall him. " If 
any brother," reads the fifth of the additional or- 
dinances, " shall become poor and needy, he shall 
be supported in food and clothing according to 
his exigency, out of the profits of the lands and 
tenants, goods and chattels of the said gild." In 
case of death he was to be " honorably buried " at 
the expense of the gild. To make sure that no 
human misery would be overlooked in the town, 
it was made the sacred duty of the alderman and 
leading gild officials, l< to visit, four times a year, 
all the infirm, all that are in want, need, poverty, 



ECONOMICS, RELIGION AND CHARITY 1 39 

and to minister and relieve all such out of the alms 
of the said-gild." 

In order that the Lynn gild may not be taken as 
an isolated example, we may briefly summarize 
the religious characteristics of the similar mer- 
chant gild in Coventry. It obtained its charter 
from Edward III in 1340. Its statutes, written 
in Old French, may be found to-day among the 
royal charters. The reasons urged for its es- 
tablishment were the economic difficulties expe- 
rienced by its merchants and craftsmen because of 
the fact that Coventry lies at a considerable dis- 
tance from the sea. 

The first concern of the " brethren and sisters " 
of the gild was to secure as many chaplains, and 
therefore as many Masses, as their means per- 
mitted, without sacrificing other important ob- 
jects. Enough money was always to be on hand 
to provide for any brother or sister who might 
have fallen into poverty. There was no need of 
countless sickness, old age, accident and other in- 
surances, since the simple gild ideal was to help a 
brother whenever and however he might need 
help. The assistance given was not to be pro- 
portioned by the amount he had paid, but by 
the extent of the charity he might require. Be- 
sides attending to the material need of its own 
brethren and sisters, the gild supported thirty-one 
men and women who were unable to gain their 
own livelihood. It furthermore kept a free lodg- 



140 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

ing house with thirteen beds for poor folk making 
religious pilgrimages or for any other " works of 
charity in honor of God and of His Saints." An 
officer was kept at the house to provide for the 
wants of the poor and a woman to wash the feet 
of the pilgrims and perform whatever corporal 
acts of mercy Christian charity might suggest. 
On the great gild feast of our Lady's Assumption, 
all the poor in the care of the gild were newly 
clad in her honor. 

Besides performing all these works the gild was 
able, at the time of which we write, to support out 
of the rent of its gild lands, four chaplains. They 
were to offer Masses and pray for the welfare of 
the entire Church, of the King and Queen, of the 
hierarchy and nobility, of all the commonalty of 
the realm, and for the brethren and sisters of the 
gild and its benefactors. The latter, as was the 
custom, had at times bestowed lands and houses 
upon the gild to increase its annual income, and 
consequently its possibility for doing good. It 
was rich, moreover, in precious chalices, vestments 
and church ornaments. 

Not only were Masses to be offered liberally for 
the departed brethren and sisters, but they were 
to be given a memento by name, in every Mass, 
for an entire year. Such apparently is the mean- 
ing of one of the gild statutes. The names, more- 
over, were to be written on a tablet and placed 
at the altar where the Masses were sung. Those 



ECONOMICS, RELIGION AND CHARITY 141 

who died in poverty were no less honorably 
buried, " as becomes a brother or sister of the 
gild." To preserve the high moral standard of 
the society no man or woman openly suspected of 
any shameful sin could be admitted. One who 
was already a member of the gild was instantly 
expelled if found guilty. 

Religion, therefore, in the minds of the gilds- 
men, was not a mere humanitarianism, such as is 
preached by so-called Christian Socialists. It im- 
plied a complete compliance with faith, dogma and 
external worship, as well as a regard for the tem- 
poral wants of the neighbor. It was all that 
Christ wished it to be when He instituted His one, 
infallible Church. To carry out in our own day 
the economic, social and civic duties which are 
implied in the faithful observance of all the teach- 
ings of this Church is often difficult in the ex- 
treme. It is, therefore, all the more necessary 
that we look from time to time at the true ideal 
as we find it expressed, in spite of abuses, in many 
of the gilds which flourished during the course 
of the Middle Ages. 

Aside from economic gilds, it should here be 
noted, there were also purely religious and 
benevolent gilds from which the former not sel- 
dom developed. The science of philanthropy 
was never again to reach the development it at- 
tained in the Middle Ages, but it was inspired by 
religion and therefore became charity because 



142 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

done in the name of Christ. The charity of the 
monks was not, as modern ignorance of medieval 
history often assumes, a mere reckless prodigality. 
It was truly scientific, providing opportunities of 
labor to the unemployed as well as affording food 
and lodging. Above all it remedied the evils of 
society at their very source as we have never been 
able to do in our later, self-glorious days. The 
final test, however, is found in the fact that it was 
absolutely efficient and effective, so that pauper- 
ism was unknown in its time, but at once came 
into being, like an overwhelming catastrophe, with 
the passing of the medieval monastery. The 
same may be said of the charity dispensed by the 
gilds. This truth must doubtless have become 
sufficiently apparent, but a brief reference may 
here be made to two religious gilds, that of the 
Palmers at Ludlow and the Gild of the Blessed 
Virgin Mary at Hull. As an instance of scien- 
tific charity we here adduce the following statute 
from the latter : 

If it befall that any of the gild, either a brother or an un- 
married sister, being young and able to work, has, through mis- 
hap, become so poor that help is much needed, there shall be 
paid to him, out of the goods of the gild, as a free grant for 
one year, ten shillings, to enable him to follow his own calling 
in such manner as he thinks best {ad mercandisandum ad opus 
suum proprium, prout sibi melius inderit expedire). And if, 
owing to weakness or any other cause that may be excused, he 
is not able to earn back the ten shillings during the first year, he 
shall be let keep the money during another year. If at the end 
of the two years he is not able to earn back the ten shillings, 



ECONOMICS, RELIGION AND CHARITY 1 43 

nor to make increase thereupon, nor to live on his own, he may 
keep the money for yet another year, in order that he may make 
a profit out of it. If at the end of the third year he is unable 
to earn back, beyond what is his own, the ten shillings with an 
increase, then the money shall be wholly released to him. 2 

While unemployment, poverty and beggary 
were thus scientifically averted in the spirit of 
Christ, the social evil was similarly warded off 
by preventive means and Christian love. Here, 
for example, is a statute from the Palmers' Gild 
that might be paralleled by countless similar ordi- 
nances: 

If any good girl of the gild, of marriageable age, cannot 
have the means found by her father, either to go into a re- 
ligious house or to marry, whichever she wishes to do, friendly 
and right help shall be given her, out of our means and our 
common chest, towards enabling her to do whatever of the two 
she wishes. 3 

All other material evils were remedied with the 
same generosity, that looked only to the extent of 
the suffering to be relieved or the greatness of 
the danger to be averted. Thus the same gild, 
which was founded in 1284, gave help in fire, 
theft, shipwreck or any other mishap, provided 
only that the members had been actually impov- 
erished. In grievous sickness the brethren and 
sisters were to be aided until restored to health. 
11 But if any one becomes a leper, or blind, or 
smitten with any other incurable disorder (which 

2 Joshua Toulmin Smith, "English Gilds," pp. 156, 157. 

3 Ibid., p. 194. 



144 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

God forbid!), we wish that the goods of the gild 
shall be largely bestowed on him." Nor did the 
charity of the gildsmen remain at home, though it 
quite properly began there. Thus the statutes 
of the Gild of St. Omar in Flanders, existing in 
the early part of the twelfth century, conclude 
with the order to remember all the poor and the 
lepers: " Postea autem omnes poster os in XPO 
monemus ut pauperum ac leprosorum miserean- 
tut." 4 

That the real progress towards industrial de- 
mocracy which we find in the merchant gilds on 
their economic side was due to the Catholic re- 
ligion rather than to any material cause must be 
obvious to the intelligent student. In a volume 
on economic problems, published by the Univer- 
sity of Chicago Press, Mr. Walton Hale Hamil- 
ton draws the following impartial conclusions in 
this regard: 

The town was born in an atmosphere saturated with the 
spirit of medieval Catholicism. Brotherhood and equality had 
long been preached by the Church. Vertical, or inter-class 
equality was never realized, either in chivalry or in the Church. 
But many medieval institutions presented a fair semblance 
of horizontal, or intra-class equality. It was under the influ- 
ence of ecclesiastical precedents that the towns established their 
new organizations. A study of the characteristic features of 
the gilds shows how great was the number of things to which 
they were indebted to religious institutions, and how few were 
the real innovations springing out of the newly created urban 

4 Memoires de la Soc. des Antiquaires de la Morinie, XVII. 
(Gross.) 



ECONOMICS, RELIGION AND CHARITY 1 45 

life. Influenced by such habits of thought and freed from the 
obstacles opposed by an already stratified society, the merchant 
gild legislated with the end in view of placing social interests 
above class or individual interests. 5 

This last is clearly the supreme ideal to be kept 
in view in all social organization and legislation. 
Yet who indeed can fail to realize how far in this 
particular we have fallen short of the social prog- 
ress made in the Middle Ages, even at the very 
beginning of their first economic organizations, the 
merchant gilds? What was true of them was no 
less true of all the medieval gilds, even of those 
whose prime object may seem to have been the 
acting of mystery plays and the presentation of 
pageants. They too, as Bishop Stubbs says, were 
organized for charity and prayer : " It was with 
this idea that men gave large estates in land to 
the gilds, which down to the Reformation formed 
an organized administration of relief." 6 

5 " Current Economic Problems," p. 24. 

• " Constitutional History of England," III, p. 648. 



CHAPTER XV 

A FIFTEENTH CENTURY GILD 

THE widespread activity and the great 
civic power of the old merchant gilds has 
already been made sufficiently clean 
The most authentic sources of information are 
fortunately available to us in the many gild ordi- 
nances that have been preserved among the royal 
charters and other ancient documents. Like all 
gild records they are the most precious historic 
monuments of the life of the people at the period 
to which they belong. For the student of social 
problems they are a veritable treasure-trove. 

In the present instance we shall select from 
these scattered documents the statutes of an insti- 
tution existing at the period when the craft gilds, 
which we are next to consider, had already at- 
tained their full development. While normally 
the merchant gild was first chartered as the only 
economic association of the early English towns 
until the craft gilds arose and finally supplanted it, 
we here find an institution which draws up new 
legislation for the various trade organizations of 
its city that are all gathered in a friendly way be- 

146 



A FIFTEENTH CENTURY GILD 1 47 

neath its aegis. Its ordinances, constitutions and 
articles, we are informed in the preamble to the 
gild statutes, were drawn up 

By the kynges commaundement and by the hole assent of the 
citesens inhabitants in the Cyte of Worcester at their yeld 
merchant (meeting of their Merchant Gild), holden the Sonday 
in the feste of the exaltacion of the holy crosse, the yere of the 
reigne of kynge Edward the fourth, after the conquest the VI. 1 

The institution of the merchant gild had at this 
period existed in England for four centuries. At 
the time in question it was already in general sup- 
planted by the trade gilds. In Worcester, as the 
statutes show, it coexisted with them and finally, 
by common consent, even legislated for them. 
It may in fact, in the present instance, be consid- 
ered as an entirely new institution resembling the 
old merchant gilds which belonged to an earlier 
date. The present ordinances therefore embody 
the result of earlier regulations, while they intro- 
duce us to a later and far more complex state of 
economic development. These facts render them 
doubly interesting. The original statutes may be 
found to-day in the archives of the city of Wor- 
cester. 

To begin with, the shrewd old burgesses well un- 
derstood the weakness of human nature, and knew 
how even Judas was tempted while carrying the 
purse. They did not know of our modern graft 
and peculation, but they were wisely beforehand 

1 September 14, 1467. 



I48 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

in preventing, as far as possible, the first begin- 
nings of such a condition. Great sums of money 
constantly came into their treasury and were paid 
out from it. Their statutes therefore ordained 
that there should be " a stronge comyn cofur wt 
VI keyes, to kepe yn ther tresour." These six 
keys were held respectively by the high bailiff, by 
one of the aldermen, by the chamberlain chosen 
11 by the grete clothynge " and by another similar 
official chosen by the commoners. The remaining 
two keys were then consigned to two " thrifty 
comyners, trewe sufficiant, and feithfulle men. 1 ' 
Collusion between these officials was practically 
impossible. 

The protective measures of the gild were very 
simple. A distinction was made between " foreyn 
burgers " and simple strangers. The former 
dwelled in the city and payed common taxes with 
the citizens, and consequently enjoyed commercial 
privileges not granted to mere strangers. Va- 
rious restrictions however applied to both classes. 
Thus neither a foreign burgher nor a stranger 
could buy barley or malt until the town brewers 
and malt-makers had been served. The gildsmen 
were ordinarily very definite in their ordinances, 
and so to avoid possible confusion here, the hour 
at which purchases might be made by foreign citi- 
zens and strangers was set at eleven of the bell in 
summer and at twelve in the winter season. 

For the privilege of standing in the gild hall 



A FIFTEENTH CENTURY GILD 1 49 

strangers were to pay id. every market day, and 
2d. every fair day. " Also that no manner foreyn 
(foreigner) sille (sell) no lether in the seid cite, 
but it be in the yelde (gild) halle of the same, 
payinge for the custom of every dyker, id." 

How great the municipal powers of the gild 
were is evident from the fact that it is ordained 
in statute 38 that no citizen be put in the common 
prison, but in one of the chambers of the gild hall, 
unless he be committed for felony or murder or 
some other heinous trespass or for a considerable 
debt. Regulations are likewise made for the po- 
lice sergeant, who for " attachment of any goods " 
at the request of a stranger may take 2d. for his 
fee from a stranger, but nothing from a citizen. 
The fee he may take from citizens in serving a 
capias for them under certain circumstances is 
strictly limited to 2d. Persons under arrest were 
to be given the choice of three courses by the bailiff. 
Either they were to accept a reasonable fine, or 
be amerced by two assessors, or else seek trial be- 
fore a jury of twelve men. The gild prescribed 
the qualifications of the jurymen, the duty of the 
sergeant impanelling the jury and the method of 
trial. 

Not only did it solve the police and the prison 
problem, but it likewise legislated to prevent un- 
employment within the city and conducted a very 
effective employment bureau. Thus no working 
people from out of town could be employed to the 



150 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

injury of the workingmen in the town. The 
method of hiring labor is thus described: 

Also it ys ordeyned by this present yelde, that all manner 
laborers that wolle be hyred wtyn (wish to be hired within) 
the cyte, that they stonde dayly at Grascroys (at the Gross- 
Cross) on the werkedays wtyn the seid cite, ther redy to alle per- 
sones suche as wolle hyre hem (wish to hire them) to their cer- 
teyn labor, for reasonable summes; in the somer season at V of 
the Belle in the mornynge, and in the wynter season at VI. And 
that proclamation be made at iiij (four) places assigned, ij 
times a quarter, by the Belmon (bellman) of the citee. 

A considerable labor population had by this 
time arisen and the gild was concerned in many 
ways about their welfare. In particular did it 
legislate against the abuse which was creeping in 
of paying the workingman in kind. They must be 
paid in gold or silver, and not by " mercery, vi- 
telle," etc. No butcher was to occupy the craft 
of a cook, and so deprive the latter of his living. 
To prevent overproduction on the one hand or an 
insufficiency of food on the other the wardens of 
the Bakers Craft were every Saturday to deter- 
mine the amount of bread that was to be baked 
during the following week. The same regulations 
was made for the ale. A special ordinance was 
made for the tilers: 

And that the Tylers of the cite sett no parliament amonge 
them, to make eny of them to be as a maister, and alle other 
tylers to be as his seruants and at his commandment, but that 
euery tyler be ffree to come and go to worche wt every man 
and citezen, frely as they may accorde, in peyn xx.s. and lesynge 



A FIFTEENTH CENTURY GILD 151 

of his ffraunches (losing his franchise) of hym thay be found 
in defaut. 

While considering the interests of the crafts- 
man, the gild never forgot the paramount good of 
the public. Thus each tyler was obliged to set 
his mark upon every tile he made, " to that ende, 
yf it be defective or smalle, that men may remedy 
of the seid partie, as lawe and reasonne requirith." 
As often as a man refused to mark a tile he was 
to pay 20s. into the common treasury. In the 
same way, to see that the ale was good and fit to 
drink, two " ale conners of sadd and discrete per- 
sones " were appointed on election day to test its 
quality. The price of the ale was fixed at every 
law day. Particular care was taken that the 
" great enquest " which was to decide the price 
was not made up " to the half partye or more " of 
brewers. There was, moreover, to be a public 
measure " to mete ale wt." The consumer could 
hardly have been better protected. It is in this 
particular again that our modern organizations, 
whether of laborers or employers, have much to 
learn from the medieval gilds. 

The merchants likewise were to have their pro- 
tection. No one was to forestall the market, by 
selling before the appointed time or out of the 
appointed place. Buying up large quantities to 
sell at a high price was prevented. No ale could 
be sold unless there was a sign at the door, and 
similarly no inn could be kept except under this 



152 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

provision. Cases of debt were tried in the gild 
hall. 

The gild provided not only for the work done 
to-day in a very perfunctory way by a pure food 
commission, but likewise took the place of the 
modern health department. All fish were to be 
examined in the market to see that they were fit to 
be eaten. Bridges were inspected and repaired. 
Cleanliness and health were to be guarded by the 
gild officials. The water near Severn bridge was 
kept pure. The ordinances contained regulations 
of every kind for the prevention of fires, and es- 
tablished a mounted bucket brigade. The gilds- 
men likewise saw to the gates and the town wall, 
ready to protect their city against any attack, and 
to fight shoulder to shoulder against a common 
foe. 

The triple institution of craftsmen, journeymen 
and apprentices was already perfectly developed 
within the city of Worcester at the period when 
these statutes were made. The craft gilds like- 
wise were in flourishing condition. All these in- 
stitutions and organizations, however, were uni- 
fied by the merchant gild. It prescribed how a 
craftsman coming into the city could be admitted 
to his craft and set up his shop, and under what 
conditions a journeyman from without could re- 
ceive permission to exercise his trade. In all 
these cases the individuals were referred to the 
wardens of the craft gilds and paid their yearly 



A FIFTEENTH CENTURY GILD 1 53 

contributions for the religious pageants and for 
the candles required on these occasions. The 
great feast of the gild was the Nativity of Saint 
John the Baptist. 

To obtain burgess (citizenship) rights a pay- 
ment was required from which the sons of a bur- 
gess and every apprentice who had served seven 
years — the full term of apprenticeship — were 
excepted. All the above articles and the other 
ordinances and constitutions were to be " openly 
redde and declared at euery law day next after 
the feste of Seynt Michell the Archangelle, yf it 
be desired." 

Institutions more or less similar to the English 
merchant gilds existed also upon the Continent, 
but in many cases there was question merely of 
associations of merchants, in our modern sense 
of the word and not of town gilds in which all 
participated. The same is true also of many of 
the later English merchant gilds, as when we read 
in the public records of a petition from the Com- 
mons to Parliament in the reign of Edward III, 
printed among their Rolls, 2 that certain whole- 
sale merchants had formed themselves into a gild 
whose real purpose was not the common good, 
but to create a monopoly for themselves. In this 
association we already find the commercial in- 
iquities of modern capitalism clearly fore- 
shadowed. It was called the Grocers' (i. e., 

2 Rot. Pari. II, 278. 



154 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

grossers) Gild, because its members " en- 
grossed/' or in our modern parlance " cornered/' 
the merchandise upon the market. The com- 
plaint of the Commons therefore was: 

That great mischiefs had newly arisen, as well to the King as 
to the great men and Commons, from the merchants called 
grocers (grossers), who engrossed all manner of merchandise 
vendible, and who suddenly raised the prices of such merchan- 
dise within the realm, putting to sale, by covin and by ordi- 
nances made among themselves, in their own society which they 
called the fraternity and gild of merchants, such merchandises as 
were most dear, and keeping in store the others until times of 
dearth and scarcity. 3 

Here, therefore, we behold the vices which the 
Church had been successfully combating all these 
years breaking out anew, until they finally gained 
complete control under the post-Reformation cap- 
italism when the suppression of her influence in 
industrial and commercial life had been brought 
about. Long before this period we can perceive, 
with the lessening of faith or devotion, the growth 
of oligarchy and monopoly in England. 

Mention of a merchant gild in Paris occurs in 
a document dating back to the year 1121. In 
Spain also the merchant gild preceded the craft 
gild. The oldest known gild record in that coun- 
try, drawn up under King Alphonso VII (1126— 
1 157), refers to the confradia of the merchants 
of Soria. 4 In Florence the consules of the mer- 

3 Rot. Pari. II, 279. 

* R. Leonard, " Ueber Handiverkgilden und Verbriiderungen 
in Spanien." 



A FIFTEENTH CENTURY GILD 1 55 

chant gild first appear in 1182 in an original docu- 
ment. 5 Everywhere we can trace the same course 
of economic development, from agriculture to 
commercial and then to craft organization. But 
in England alone do we find the universal develop- 
ment of the merchant gild as a true town organ- 
ization in its early period, so that by the end of 
the thirteenth century eighty-two out of 102 Eng- 
lish towns had their flourishing merchant gilds. 
Only later were merchant gilds in England also 
to become mere gilds of business men, established 
for foreign commerce or the control of some par- 
ticular trade within their own town. 

In this connection it is important to remember 
the three meanings, which as C. Gross points 
out, the word " merchant " implied at three differ- 
ent periods of English history: 

At first it embraced all who, in their trade, were in any way 
connected with buying and selling, including petty shopkeepers 
and many handicraftsmen. During the fifteenth and the great 
part of the sixteenth century it applied preeminently to all who 
made a business of buying for resale — retailers as well as 
wholesalers — manual craftsmen not being included. It then 
came to have its present significance of an extensive dealer. In 
this conception the old " gild merchant " represents the first 
stage ; the " companies of merchants " the second ; the " staplers " 
and " merchant adventurers " the third. 6 

Merchant staplers were those who, under the 

5 Santini, " Documenti dell' antica costituzione del Comune di 
Firenze, p. 18. 

•"The Gild Merchant," I, p. 157. 



156 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

British Administration, exported the principal raw 
materials after the export trade had passed from 
the hands of the German Hanse merchants. The 
staples themselves were specified towns to which 
these wares had to be brought for sale or expor- 
tation. Merchant adventurers constituted a 
private company whose members held the monop- 
oly of exporting certain manufactured articles. 
So the word, which at first practically applied 
to every independent craftsman, finally came to 
receive its present significance and contains in 
its various meanings an entire history of social 
development. 



CHAPTER XVI 

FIRST CHRISTIAN TRADE UNIONS 

THE origin of craft gilds, or Christian 
trade unions, the most important social 
institutions of the Middle Ages, and in- 
deed of all history, followed directly upon the de- 
velopment of the merchant gilds. The purpose 
of these newly arisen organizations of specialized 
craftsmen was the mutual protection of their 
members; the promotion of the common indus- 
trial and commercial interests of the city as well 
as of their own fraternity; and the fostering of 
that spirit of brotherhood, based upon super- 
natural motives, which was to last through life 
and continue beyond the shadow of death. 

Before approaching this important subject a 
short review will be in place to trace the various 
stages of development that finally led to the or- 
ganization of the free craft gilds. 

Agriculture, as we have seen, was almost the 
universal employment of men during the period 
of social reconstruction, after the tidal wave of 
pagan barbarism had swept over the civilization 
of Europe and the Church began anew her work 
of Christianizing and civilizing the world. Spe- 
cialized craftsmen were rare or unknown in com- 

i57 



158 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

munities where each family built its own home,, 
spun its own clothing, and drew its sustenance 
from the flocks it reared and the crops it planted. 
There was consequently only a very gradually de- 
veloping need of them. Over all Europe the re- 
ligious communities of this period were the cen- 
ters of economic development as they were the 
hearths that kept alive the spark of learning be- 
neath the cinders of almost universal destruction. 
They were in turn to become the first trade schools 
as previously they had taught the cultivation of 
the soil to the roaming hordes of barbarians, and 
in due time were to hold up for their descendants 
the torch of learning and unseal for them the wis- 
dom of the ages. 

It was still, however, a far cry from the first 
scattered craftsmen, a few of whom might suffice 
for the growing village communities, and the or- 
ganized craft gilds which were to play so impor- 
tant a role in the life of the Middle Ages. As 
civilization grew more complex the free crafts- 
men, where these existed, united with other free- 
men of their communities into the frith or 
11 peace " gilds for the prevention of theft and the 
preservation of order. In the course of time the 
merchant gilds arose, particularly in England. 
Since craftsmen were likewise merchants at this 
period they were, in the latter country at least, ab- 
sorbed into these new organizations, in which the 
great body of burghers were originally united 



FIRST CHRISTIAN TRADE UNIONS 1 59 

for the protection -of their own and their city's in- 
terest and trade. 

Often the same men were both the gild and 
the town officials. Men of the same town might, 
moreover, still remain under the jurisdiction of 
their various lords, but when engaged in the oc- 
cupations of their trade or the sale of the mer- 
chandise they had produced they were all mem- 
bers of the same town gild and subject to its reg- 
ulations only. 

It is evident that in none of these stages was 
there any call for specialized gilds of artisans. 
But the towns now grew rapidly in population. 
Economic conditions became more complex. The 
villeins, or unfree workmen, were fast emanci- 
pating themselves. The ranks of free craftsmen 
were constantly swelling. The merchant gilds, 
where they existed, no longer sufficed. The time 
was ripe for a new stage of economic develop- 
ment, and the craft gilds, which answered to the 
growing need, sprang into being. Soon prac- 
tically everywhere they had taken their place 
throughout Christendom. 

Prescinding from the unions said to have been 
organized among the serfs, the beginning of the 
craft gilds proper may be ascribed to the early 
part of the twelfth century, although isolated in- 
stances can be found even in the preceding cen- 
tury. Thus we read of the victory won, in the 
year 1032, by the Flemish weavers of Courtrai 



l6o DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

in the defense of their city. Mention is made of 
the weavers of Mayence in 1099. In Paris there 
is a royal confirmation, in 1162, of the consue- 
tudines carnificum, or the statutes of the Butchers' 
Gild, which itself dates back in its origin to the 
earliest times. The church of St. Pierre aux 
Boeufs, on the island to which Paris was then con- 
fined, is thought to have taken its name from this 
gild. 

Yet in practically every country the earliest 
known gilds were the gilds of the weavers. The 
first craft gilds of England are recorded under 
the reign of Henry I, 1100-1133. The " Pipe 
Roll " mentions the weavers' gilds of Oxford, 
Huntington, Winchester, Lincoln, London; the 
fullers of Winchester and the cordwainers of Ox- 
ford. Material for clothing was everywhere the 
first great industrial demand. 

Other trade gilds followed in rapid succession 
and gradually obtained official recognition from 
the Government or the King. In 1130 the Eng- 
lish gilds of weavers at London, Lincoln and Ox- 
ford were making their annual remittance to the 
royal treasury in return for their official recogni- 
tion. The possibility of levying additional taxes 
may often have been no slight inducement for 
granting authorization to the numerous craft gilds 
that now sprang into existence. Gilds not thus 
authorized were known as " adulterine. " They 
could not claim the privileges of chartered organ- 



FIRST CHRISTIAN TRADE UNIONS l6l 

izations, though they might be permitted to con- 
tinue unmolested. The new gilds were the more 
welcome in as far as they strengthened the au- 
thority of the ruling sovereign by weakening the 
power of the barons. Towards the middle of the 
fourteenth century the craft gilds, or medieval 
trade unions, had therefore become a character- 
istic feature in the industrial life of England. 

The unfolding of the craft gilds in England was 
comparatively normal, and outbreaks of violence 
were apparently rare. The merchant gilds of 
each important town, as has been shown, had 
previously embraced the craftsmen as well as the 
leading burghers occupied in other pursuits. 
Gradually, for various reasons, the craftsmen 
withdrew from this larger gild to form organiza- 
tions restricted more or less to their own trade. 
In some cases they may still for a time have 
remained members of the original gild. Each 
withdrawal of a craft to form its own union meant 
a weakening of the merchant gild, whose province 
was thus ever more and more restricted, since its 
purpose originally had been the monopoly and 
control of the municipal trade and toll. As long 
as the communities were small and the burghers 
were practically all united in the town gild, the 
need of craft organizations was not felt, nor were 
they possible in many cases. As the towns grew 
in population and the gilds increased in size, it 
was natural that a division should take place. 



1 62 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

The greater and more prosperous the towns the 
greater also was the division of labor. In smaller 
boroughs the merchant gild might still remain in 
all its vigor, but in the larger cities the aggregate 
of the craft gilds usually took over the functions 
and the power that had once belonged to the an- 
cient merchant gild, which ceased to be, or con- 
tinued merely in a nominal state. In some cities 
its name was still applied as late as the sixteenth 
and seventeenth centuries to the entire group of 
craft gilds. In other instances the latter were 
fused again into a single body, as in the Worcester 
gild. 

Sooner or later, however, the craft gilds dom- 
inated everywhere, each charged with the control 
of its own branch of industry, under municipal or 
royal authority. The vague general rule that the 
merchant gild was prior to the former by an en- 
tire century cannot be applied upon the Conti- 
nent as readily as in England. It was to the lat- 
ter country alone that we turned to study in detail 
the systematic development of the merchant gilds. 
Upon the Continent their appearance was spo- 
radic, while they often differ greatly in their nature 
and usually were purely associations of business 
men. The craft gilds, however, though always 
enjoying their local peculiarities, were sufficiently 
alike to allow of broad generalization. Their 
similarity indeed is one of the most remarkable 
characteristics of the Middle Ages. This fact 



FIRST CHRISTIAN TRADE UNIONS 1 63 

is the more striking when we consider the wide 
separation in space, the difficulty of communica- 
tion, and the practical isolation of the cities. 

How far the English merchant gilds themselves 
became exclusive, and so necessitated the forma- 
tion of new organizations, it is difficult to say 
with certainty. In not a few of the towns weav- 
ers and fullers, we know, were denied the rights 
of free burgess as long as they exercised their 
trade. As one of the comparatively few instances 
left on record in England, we may mention the 
laws set down for the weavers and fullers of cer- 
tain cities in the London " Book of Customs. " All 
sale of cloth, wholesale and retail, was forbidden 
these craftsmen, and legislation was enacted that 
they must not dispose of their wares even outside 
the town limits, lest they interfere with the trade 
of the local gild. They were thus permitted to 
dispose of their cloth to no one except the town 
merchants. Nor was this their only grievance. 
Not only was all their work to be done for the 
" good men " of the town, but they could not even 
practise their trade itself without obtaining the 
consent of the former. No merchant or franke 
homme could be brought into court by a weaver 
or fuller, nor could the latter be summoned as a 
witness against him. 1 As the gildsmen in such 
instances had grown in wealth and power their 

X W. J. Ashley, "An Introduction to English Economic His- 
tory," Part I, p. 84. 



164 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

Christian democratic principles had apparently 
suffered in proportion. A Christian renewal was 
needed. 

Upon the Continent itself the struggle attending 
the establishment of the new craft gilds was far 
more severe. Of this we shall speak in the fol- 
lowing chapter. A great economic readjustment 
was taking place over all the earth, and the result 
was to be the wonderfully organized and firmly 
established craft-gild system, which was to con- 
tinue supreme and intact for centuries. 



CHAPTER XVII 

THE WORLD'S GREATEST LABOR 
MOVEMENT 

THERE is but one parallel in history to the 
universal unrest of the laboring classes 
following the World War, and their ef- 
fective determination to better their economic and 
social conditions. It is to be found in the rise of 
the craft gilds upon the Continent. Many epochs 
of " storm and stress M and various periods of 
world conquest had preceded this event, but none 
of these ever profoundly affected the masses of 
the people or radically altered their conditions of 
life. During all the centuries of pagan civiliza- 
tion, in the great empires of the ancient world, 
the laborers as a class might change their mas- 
ters with the change of rulers and of dynasties, 
but they could not better their position. 

Similarly in modern times the great industrial 
revolution, which completely transformed the 
methods of production, left the worker in the 
most helpless dependence on capital and the ma- 
chine. The Reformation, as Protestant econo- 
mists frankly state, had but hastened this result: 
" The later Lutheran overstress on the rights of 
the individual," testifies the Rev. Frank Monroe 

165 



1 66 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

Crouch in the Churchman, " found at least an in- 
direct result in the socio-political philosophy of 
laissez-faire, which, in conjunction with the indus- 
trial revolution, brought about the economic con- 
ditions that have occasioned widespread revolt 
during the last century, both in Europe and Amer- 
ica. " Luther's own remorseless demand for the 
blood of the warring peasants ended his prestige 
with labor. 1 So too the French Revolution, 
though itself partly a labor movement and aris- 
ing out of the conditions of extreme social oppres- 
sion then existing, was local in its action, relent- 
lessly cruel, bloody and irreligious in its methods, 
and terminated in the elevation of a courtezan to 
the altar of Notre Dame as the goddess of the 
new liberty. Its final result was the subjection of 
the masses to the merciless exploitation of capi- 
talism. Stripped of his last right of organiza- 
tion the laborer was now rendered more helpless 
than before. His lot, indeed, as Pope Leo wrote, 
was " little better than slavery." 2 

The terrorism of the French Revolution can 
almost find its counterpart in some of the more 
recent excesses of Bolshevism. Yet the signifi- 
cance of the labor movement throughout the world 
in the period following the World War was not 
to be obscured by these. Unfortunately the in- 
jection of the spirit of irreligion again proved it- 

1 Husslein and Reville, " What Luther Taught," chapter VI. 

2 "The Condition of the Working Classes/' 



world's greatest labor movement 167 

self the greatest peril of modern labor, precisely 
as the Faith of the Middle Ages was the very 
strength that made possible the winning of the 
only universal labor victory recorded in all his- 
tory, a victory achieved with moderation and com- 
paratively few outbreaks of violence, if we con- 
sider the universality and thoroughness of its ef- 
fects. It was in fact to last on unbroken until 
the coming of a new social era. 

Everywhere in the growing medieval towns, 
from the eleventh to the thirteenth century, we 
find the gradual banding together of the Catholic 
freemen into social and religious unions according 
to their respective crafts. They little realized 
that they were launching then the world's greatest 
labor movement. They were in fact organizing 
the first Christian trade unions to work out in 
this manner their more complete emancipation, to 
maintain their industrial and civic independence, 
to preserve within their own hands, though under 
proper sanction of legitimate courts and rulers, 
the control of the various trades on which their 
livelihood depended, and to establish on a true 
and Christian foundation the dignity of honest 
labor. So in the course of time, throughout all 
Europe, the system of craft gilds came into being. 
Based on the personal and not the communal own- 
ership of the means of production by the workers, 
and on their joint control, under proper public 
authority, of the industries in which they were 



I 68 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

engaged and of the marketing of the wares which 
they produced, the craft gilds were in their origin 
the ideal democratic solution of the social prob- 
lem of their age. 

But more than this, they stand out in all the 
history of the world as labor's supreme achieve- 
ment. Feudalism, curbed by the Church at all 
times, was fast outliving its period of real social 
service. The burghers in the small towns were 
seeking for industrial freedom from their feudal 
lords. Servile dues were gradually cast off for 
a single payment or an annual tax, and the right 
of gild courts, in place of trial before the lord, 
and of gild-controlled markets was effectively won 
by them. Charters containing their privileges 
were granted and respected by the King or lord 
to whom they rendered their allegiance. So, one 
by one, their economic and civic rights or priv- 
ileges were gained and maintained. But the 
struggle, which by the fourteenth century had 
practically everywhere been successfully ter- 
minated, was not merely directed against oppres- 
sive feudal lords, but also against a new form of 
capitalism that threatened to submerge both labor 
and the craft gilds. 

In England, as we have seen, no real struggle 
of the craft gilds occurred. The way had been 
prepared for them by the old merchant or town 
gild, which had purchased or otherwise obtained 
charter privileges and protected its members 



world's greatest labor movement 169 

against the incroachments of feudal lords. Sel- 
dom did these old gilds become oppressive. As 
the democratic institutions of their day they had 
originally embraced almost all the free burghers of 
their respective towns. They now merely disap- 
peared or yielded in importance to the new craft 
gilds that had been formed out of their own mem- 
bership. In Scotland, however, bitter struggles 
ensued between the trade unions and the ancient 
gilds as late as the fifteenth and sixteenth cen- 
turies. The Scotch " gildry n had largely devel- 
oped into organizations of rich merchants, who 
continued to retain to a great extent the political 
control of the burghal councils and could alone be 
chosen as magistrates. 

As early as the twelfth century the Leges Burg- 
orum enacted that: " No dyer, butcher or cob- 
bler may be admitted to the Gild Merchant un- 
less he abjures the practice of his trade by his own 
hands and conducts it only by those serving under 
him." 3 In the thirteenth century fullers and 
weavers were apparently excluded, but not the 
craftsmen as a class. The craft gilds, as such, ac- 
cording to Gross, exercised as yet no political 
power in the civic community. 

It was upon the Continent, however, that the 
real struggle of these first trade unions in Chris- 
tian times took place. The emancipation in ever 

3 Cosmo Innes, " Ancient Laws and Customs of the Burghs 
of Scotland," p. 46, Gross. 



170 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

greater numbers of the serfs upon the landed es- 
tates and their crowding into the cities, together 
with the natural growth of the latter, naturally 
resulted in a comparatively large population who 
lived by the labor of their hands and personally 
produced the wares which they sold. Many of 
the ancient gilds, which perhaps had originated 
as popular democratic associations, now grad- 
ually became exclusive, oligarchic and oppressive. 
Membership was often retained within the same 
families and extravagant entrance fees were de- 
manded to exclude new applicants. The distinc- 
tion between rich and poor was daily more 
marked. Not only did the former obtain con- 
trol of gild and city, but they soon succeeded in 
excluding from their organization all who lived by 
handicraft. Ordinances were enacted denying ad- 
mission to all who had not relinquished the prac- 
tice of their trade for at least a year and a day. 
11 Soiled hands " and " blue nails M were specified 
in various gild statutes of different countries as 
badges of toil debarring a citizen from gild com- 
munion. 4 Yet without the privileges accorded by 
gild membership it was impossible for him to com- 
pete with the richer merchants in the profitable 
exercise of his chosen trade. He would there- 
fore be obliged to labor for them. Not the com- 
mon good, but their own profit was the end in 

4 Brentano, Wilcia, Herbert, etc. 



world's greatest labor movement 171 

view. Such was the menace of medieval capi- 
talism. 

There had arisen against the craftsman a 
joint conspiracy of the nobility of the land and 
the aristocracy of wealth. Taking account of al- 
tered circumstances of time and place, conditions 
were not so very different from those created un- 
der the post-Reformation capitalism of modern 
times. Just as the chains of the old bondage of 
villeinage or serfdom were being broken there 
arose the danger that new ones would be forged 
to bind the freeman. The laborer was often com- 
pelled by necessity to place himself under the 
protection of a patrician, to render him service 
and pay him taxes. At times the old merchant 
families and the nobility, who controlled the city, 
assumed the administration for themselves and 
threw the burdens upon the craftsmen, who were 
held in equal disrespect by both. 

The oppression of the craftsmen was partic- 
ularly aggravated at Cologne, where the Bishop 
sided with the weavers against the patrician ele- 
ment. On November 21, 137 1, the execution of 
thirty-three weavers took place in this city and 
1,800 men, according to Brentano, were exiled 
with their wives and children. 5 The fact that on 
this occasion the churches and monasteries were 

5 Lujo Brentano, " History and Development of Gilds and the 
Origin of Trade Unions," pp. 46, 47. 



172 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

ordered searched indicates upon what side the 
sympathy of the clergy and religious lay. They 
were seriously suspected, at all events, of harbor- 
ing the craftsmen from the violence of their ene- 
mies. 

If instances of ecclesiastics of religious com- 
munities can be adduced that might apparently 
place the Church in an unfavorable light, all doubt 
regarding her real attitude must disappear when 
we consider that the entire gild system, which the 
craftsmen of these centuries were everywhere con- 
structing, enjoyed not merely the sympathy, but 
the positive support of the clergy. In all instances 
the priest was the chaplain of the craft gild, a 
position which he could not have maintained, 
universally and invariably as he did, in opposi- 
tion to the Church. No such opposition was ever 
expressed by her. On the contrary, the craft gilds 
grew from suspected institutions into power and 
influence under the eyes of the priest-chaplain, 
with the tacit or open sanction of bishops and ab- 
bots, and beneath the fostering care of the Church 
herself. They were as truly religious institutions 
as economic and social organizations. They 
sprang up out of the soil of Catholicism and were 
lovingly hedged in by the Church against all ag- 
gression. The error of historians has often been 
to mistake the individual action of certain inter- 
ested and perhaps highly worldly prelates for the 
policy and the spirit of the Church herself. 



world's greatest labor movement 173 

Nothing could be more unfair. The attitude of 
the people towards the Church and of the Church 
towards the people is thus briefly expressed by 
Dr. Cutts, a non-Catholic authority: 

One reason for the popularity of the Medieval Church was 
that it has always been the champion of the people, and the 
friend of the poor. In politics the Church was always on the 
side of the liberties of the people against the tyranny of the 
feudal lords. 6 

, If now we remember that in England and upon 
the Continent the most intimate relation had ev- 
erywhere and at all times existed between gild- 
ship and citizenship, that chartering a gild and 
chaptering a city were often identical, and that 
" gildsmen " and " citizens," though not coexten- 
sive, are often practically synonymous in royal de- 
crees, we can understand how the official authoriza- 
tion of the craft gilds was an act which violently 
conflicted with the interests both of the patrician 
classes and of the ruling merchant families. It 
frustrated completely the efforts of the latter to 
make of their gilds an exclusive oligarchy of 
wealth while it helped to break the power of the 
feudal lords and strengthened the national govern- 
ments. The struggle of the new organizations 
was for equal rights and equal privileges. New 
citizens were constantly created through their ef- 
forts, outnumbering the old aristocracy. The for- 
mal recognition of the craft gilds therefore meant 

6 Quoted, London Universe, April 26, 1918. 



174 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

nothing less than a complete readjustment of civic 
as well as of economic conditions throughout Eu- 
rope. Their victory may rightly be considered 
as one of the most important recorded in history. 
Yet because it was won without flourish of trum- 
pets and crash of armies and storming of ancient 
citadels, the historian has often failed to realize 
that it was of immeasurably greater importance 
and profounder human interest than all the idle 
conquests of an Alexander or Napoleon. 

The Church had been present at the birth of 
this vast movement. She had captained it with 
her priests and religious, to whom the honest 
craftsmen looked for counsel and for guidance, 
and in whom he confided with loving reverence 
and trust. She was present also at the victory 
and saw that it was tempered with charity as it 
was animated with the spirit of justice. Rich 
and poor alike are her children and she has equal 
care of both; but her predilection, like that of her 
Divine Master, must always be with the weak and 
the lowly and those who have most need of her 
protecting arm. 



CHAPTER XVIII 

TRUE INDUSTRIAL DEMOCRACY 



B 



"^-"^ACK to the gilds !" is the cry of our 
age. Many who, at first blush, might 
repudiate any such intention are in 
reality working eagerly to bring about their own 
gild ideals. Nothing therefore is of greater im- 
portance at the present moment than a clear con- 
ception of the true nature of the medieval craft 
gilds, on which, with proper adaptations, every 
modern program of reconstruction must be based. 
Aside from some of the early merchant or town 
gilds, they afford us the only instance of industrial 
democracy throughout the whole extent of the 
world's history. 

It would be folly to claim for them an abso- 
lute perfection. Like all other human institu- 
tions, they passed through various stages of de- 
velopment. Our reference here is solely to the 
period when gildhood was in flower. A great 
similarity existed among the trade gilds of all the 
various Catholic countries of the Middle Ages. 
They everywhere gradually assumed the same 
forms of industrial organization, but they did not 
everywhere progress with the same rapidity or 

i75 



176 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

show the same high conceptions of industrial de- 
mocracy. The period during which gildhood may 
be said to have arrived at its full flowering time 
began in some countries with the thirteenth cen- 
tury, and lasted until the close of the fifteenth. 
Craft gilds however existed, as we have seen, at 
an even earlier period and continued until a con- 
siderably later date, not seldom maintaining them- 
selves in a more or less prosperous condition. 
Thus at Aries there was a College of Heads of 
Crafts in the twelfth century, but only in the thir- 
teenth century were the gilds fully organized. 
The legislation then drawn up remained in its 
essentials until 1791. 1 

" Crafts " and " misteries," are the names ordi- 
narily given to these institutions by the English 
craftsmen. The latter name is derived from the 
Latin minis terium, meaning a service or office in 
which any one is engaged. The two words are 
not infrequently used together, so that we read of 
the founding of a " craft and mistery." The 
word " gild ,f itself continued in use from the 
earliest days, but is general in its application and 
applies to organizations of every kind. The 
French name corresponding to our " craft gild " is 
metier, the Italian arte and the German Zunft. 

The craft gilds were not established for the 
sake of creating an exclusive trade monopoly. 

1 Etienne Martin Saint-Leon, u Histoire Des Corporations de 
Metiers " pp. 62, 63. 






TRUE INDUSTRIAL DEMOCRACY 1 77 

Every craftsman was welcomed, and even urged 
to join his own craft gild. Their purpose was to 
include within each association all the approved 
workmen employed in the same trade within the 
same town. The number of these gilds increased 
with the constantly increasing specialization of 
the crafts themselves, until finally almost every 
industry was divided into a variety of gilds. 
There was a period when this separation became 
excessive, but we are speaking of the craft gilds 
at their perfection. Their prime object was the 
regulation of trading conditions within their own 
locality. Hence the necessity of bringing into the 
gild or including under its economic control every 
townsman who desired to engage in any organ- 
ized craft. Instances were not wanting where 
craft gilds, like our modern federations of labor, 
extended over entire districts. Thus the great 
Silesian Tailors' Gild, embraced in its jurisdiction 
no fewer than twenty-five towns. 2 Both the cut- 
lers' and the builders' gilds of Germany were fed- 
eralized into four central organizations. 3 

Trade monopoly, however, was sought, not for 
its own sake but as the sole condition under which 
the gild could effectively exercise the management 
and supervision of its own craft. In this way 
only was it possible to legislate regarding the price 
of raw material as well as of the finished product; 

2 Berlepsch, II, p. 230. 

3 Brentano, " History and Development of Gilds," pp. 70, 71. 



178 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

to determine the maximum hours of work, the 
number of apprentices and journeymen that might 
be engaged by a single master, the years of ap- 
prenticeship and the wages of assistants; to in- 
spect in the interest of the consumer the quan- 
tity, measure or weight of the product offered for 
sale ; to prevent, in fine, undue competition, exces- 
sive wealth or unnecessary poverty. In this way 
only could the highest standards of workmanship 
and of morality be secured. No one might be 
admitted into a craft gild who had not given due 
evidence of technical skill or whose fair name was 
sullied in any respect. As W. Cunningham 
rightly says upon this point : 

The purpose of these gilds was the regulation of work in such 
fashion that the public might be well served and that the trade 
might therefore flourish. . . . The effort was to secure satis- 
factory conditions for production — skilled workers and honest 
materials — and to ensure a price which should be "reason- 
able " to receive and therefore reasonable to pay for such ware 
thus made. 4 

The fact that there might exist, under such a 
system, a number of " half-taught helpers and 
unskilled laborers, " not included in the member- 
ship of any of the craft gilds, does not militate 
against the purely democratic nature of these as- 
sociations. True democracy, industrial as well as 
political, is not a blind leveling process, but a 
condition of society in which the rights of all are 

4 " The Growth of English Industry and Commerce during 
the Early and Middle Ages," I, p. 342. 



TRUE INDUSTRIAL DEMOCRACY 1 79 

religiously respected, and ample opportunities for 
economic self-development are offered. The 
chimerical conception of a society which would 
obliterate all distinctions is not to be classed as 
an ideal of democracy but as a mad utopia. It is 
built up neither on the Gospel of Christ nor on the 
nature of man. The gilds at their perfection 
never overlooked the needs and rights of all the 
classes comprised within the commonwealth. 
They knew of no class-warfare such as was later 
to arise. The master workman had attained his 
full political and economic liberty and did not 
envy those who might be above him in legal or 
spiritual authority, nor did he forget the rights 
of those who, in the. same religious spirit, were 
duly subject to him in his own little workshop. 
In this happy age, as Professor Seligman says : 

A conflict of interests was unknown. The journeyman always 
looked forward to the period when he would be admitted to the 
freedom of the trade. This was as a rule not difficult for an 
expert workman to attain. No insuperable obstacle was thrown 
in his path. In fact there was no superabundance of skilled 
labor at this time. It was a period of supremacy of labor over 
capital, and the master worked beside the artisan. 5 

The exclusiveness of the gilds was not there- 
fore of the nature of a modern monopoly, since 
all who would properly qualify themselves, as 
true men and true workers, might be admitted. 
When in later years serious economic restrictions 

5 G. R. A. Seligman, " Ten Chapters on the Medieval Guilds 
of England" (1887). 



l8o DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

were introduced, it was merely a sign that the 
craft gilds, like many of the Continental merchant 
gilds before them, had arrived at the period of 
their decline. That abuses might exist at any 
period is sufficiently obvious. They can nowhere 
be eliminated. Thus we read of complaints 
brought as early as 132 1 against the London 
weavers that they were misusing their power by 
demanding excessive entrance fees for admission 
to their gild and so unduly limiting the number 
of licensed workmen. 6 In general, however, 
a small entrance fee only was exacted. Special 
taxes were levied as occasion arose. Regular dues 
were demanded at a later period only. But dona- 
tions were frequent, bequests were constantly 
made, and the gilds were always financially well 
supplied. 

The trade monopoly, legally exercised by the 
craft gilds, was always a great advantage to the 
town itself. Not seldom the organization of a 
gild was insisted upon by the municipal authori- 
ties in order to secure the proper regulation of 
production and sale. The reputation, and conse- 
quently the prosperity of a town, depended upon 
the quality of its wares. To maintain this at its 
highest mark the vigilance of a thoroughly organ- 
ized craft gild was indispensable. Besides, it 
saved all the civic expenses that would else be in- 

6 W. J. Ashley, " An Introduction to English Economic His- 
tory and Theory," II, p. 75. 



TRUE INDUSTRIAL DEMOCRACY l8l 

curred for the citizens by a large corps of munici- 
pal and police officials. As a pertinent example 
we may instance the reasons given for the estab- 
lishment of the Bristol gild, probably in 1392, 
which was known as " The Craft of St. John the 
Baptist and the Craft of Tailors." 

The craft of tailors in this honorable town, we 
are informed in its ordinances, had been and was 
14 greatly slandered in many parts of the realm." 
The reason given is that any person might prac- 
tise the craft at that time, though " not skilled in 
the art of clothing, or not belonging to the busi- 
ness, or one who steals the cloth entrusted to him, 
to the great slander of the town and craft, and 
to the danger of the people in default that good 
ordinance is not made in this town." It is there- 
fore ordained that as in London, in York and in 
other towns of the realm, " No man of the craft 
of tailors shall be received into the franchise or 
freedom of this craft to cut any cloth, unless he 
be first presented by the master and wardens of 
the craft to the mayor of this town, as an able and 
skilful person in his craft." If therefore it could 
be shown that he was of good condition, good 
name and full perfect in his trade, he was to be 
received into the gild. All further responsibility 
concerning malpractice of any kind in the tailor- 
ing business of that town was thenceforth taken 
by the gild. 

To carry into effect the many craft rules regard- 



I 82 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

ing quantity and quality of work, prices 
and hours, purchase, sharing and sale, it is evi- 
dent that an extensive craft jurisdiction was re- 
quired. The amount of civic authority and execu- 
tive power thus delegated to the craft officials 
varied largely in different countries and at differ- 
ent times. The gilds had their own courts in 
which members were tried for delinquencies and 
punished with fines. It is not improbable that 
in some instances the gild jurisdiction was almost 
absolute within its own province. Thus the Lon- 
don weavers could insist upon trial before their 
own court rather than before the civil authorities. 
Or the process was reversed and the gildsman was 
directly tried before his own gild court for the 
violation of gild statutes, but remained at liberty 
to demand a trial before the mayor. Thus the 
regulation of an English cutlers' gild, drawn up 
in 1344, reads: " As to all those of the said 
trade who do not wish to be tried by the wardens 
of the trade for the time being, the names of 
such shall be presented to the mayor and alder- 
men, and by them shall be judged. " 7 

Gild courts were held at regular intervals, pre- 
sided over by gild officials. A gild sergeant was 
sent to summon offenders. Thus, unlike many of 
our modern laws dealing with the interests of in- 
dustry or commerce, all the gild regulations re- 
garding production, purchase and sale were 

7 Riley, "Memorials of London," p. 218. 



TRUE INDUSTRIAL DEMOCRACY 1 83 

strictly carried out with neither the de^ay nor the 
expense of our modern systems. The penalties 
of money imposed were applied to the needs of 
the association or devoted to the purchase of 
wax for candles which every gild burned at its 
shrines or in its churches. Confiscation of arti- 
cles illegally purchased or produced was also 
within the gild jurisdiction. Most serious of all 
punishments, however, was that which expelled a 
member from the gild, whether for immorality or 
obdurate violation of laws, and so excluded him 
from the right to practise his craft in the town 
as a master craftsman. The statutes in conform- 
ity with which these sentences were passed had 
usually been drawn up by the craftsmen them- 
selves and received the municipal sanction or the 
seal of some higher authority. They thus right- 
fully became the law of the city for which the gild 
was established and contributed their own impor- 
tant share towards promoting the common good 
of all the inhabitants. They were drawn up with 
no selfish hand, but in a spirit of fair play for 
all and thus effectively prevented both profiteer- 
ing and special privilege, excessive wages or un- 
just pay, high prices or inadequate returns, careless 
labor and over-work. How this was brought 
about we shall consider in another chapter. 

The spirit of Christian democracy which per- 
meated many of these early organizations is per- 
haps best exemplified by the custom introduced in 



184 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

various French gilds of making their annual 
change of craft officials during the chanting of 
the Magnificat at the Vespers. " In the middle 
of the verse, ' He hath set down the mighty from 
their seat,' the organ and the singing ceased while 
the past warden left his place and delivered up 
the insignia of his office. At the conclusion of the 
verse, 4 He hath exalted the humble,' the new 
warden was conducted to his seat." 8 While the 
craft gilds continued in this spirit there could be 
no danger for the safety of the industrial democ- 
racy confided to such leaders. 

The two following chapters shall present under 
still other aspects this " True Industrial Democ- 
racy " of the Middle Ages. 

8 Abbot Snow, O. S. B., " The Church and Labor," p. 29. 



CHAPTER XIX 

LIVE AND LET LIVE 

MDENYS-COCHIN, Deputy from 
Paris, relates in the Journal Offi- 
• ciel, 1 how when he was a member of 
the Board of Aldermen two of his associates in 
office were Socialist workingmen, rather advanced 
in years. One of them he describes as of un- 
usual refinement and learning, un vieillard char- 
mant. Arguing with him one day the future Dep- 
uty said: u You hold that the working class is 
not fairly treated now-a-days. At what period 
of history, in your opinion, was the laborer best 
provided for and had the least reason for com- 
plaint? " The Socialist paused for a moment and 
then said: " Now I know that Til surprise you, 
but it seems to me it was at the end of the reign 
of St. Louis." He had evidently read to advant- 
age the famous " Livre des Metiers" 2 

The master craftsman of the Middle Ages was 
capitalist, laborer, merchant and entrepreneur in 
one. He was none of these exclusively, because 

1 January 19, 1910. 

2 fitienne Boileau, Prevote of Paris in 1258. The first part of 
his book is divided into a hundred different titles, each dealing 
with a gild, corporation, 

185 



I 86 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

he embraced the functions of them all. He him- 
self bought the raw material of his trade, unless 
purchased for him by the customer whose orders 
he fulfilled, made his own wares and personally 
sold them in his shop or at the fair. The gild 
did not permit any unnecessary intrusion of a 
middleman, and so successfully prevented those 
crying inequalities that were to arise in later days. 
All were assured of a reasonable competence 
and no one could shirk the ordinance of labor. 
But labor itself was then held in honor and not 
considered an indignity as in the days of ancient 
or of modern paganism. 

Idleness was a vice not tolerated in a gildsman. 
No craft master might ever work by proxy. 
Each one, except in case of sickness, was obliged 
to manage his own small enterprise and lead in 
the labor of the day. Widows only might em- 
ploy a substitute. The number of apprentices and 
assistants whom a single master might engage 
was strictly limited. This was done in the in- 
terest of the apprentices, who else could not re- 
ceive a proper education; in the interest of the 
journeymen, who else would compete with child 
labor; and in the interest of the master craftsman 
whose shop, however little, might fairly rival 
that of the wealthiest burgher. If it is true that 
production was somewhat reduced by these meth- 
ods, it is certainly true to an even far greater ex- 
tent that the general happiness and the common 



LIVE AND LET LIVE 1 87 

welfare, temporal and spiritual, were greatly in- 
creased. To promote this end is after all the ob- 
ject of society. 

For this same reason no man might engage in 
more than a single trade. In the " Secular Re- 
formation " of Emperor Sigismund, 1434, the 
following law is enacted: 

The crafts have been devised for this purpose, that every- 
body by them should earn his daily bread, and nobody should 
interfere with the craft of another By this the world gets rid 
of its misery, and every one may find his livelihood. If there 
be one who is a wineman, he shall have to do with this trade, 
and shall not practise another thing besides. The same shall 
hold if he is a bread-baker and the like, no craft excepted. 
And it is to be prevented on Imperial command, and to be fined 
with forty marks of gold, where it is heard that the Imperial 
towns do not attend to this, that so nobody of any trade what- 
ever may interfere with the craft of another. 3 

Thus the gild regulation received the support 
of the Crown. Usually however the gildsmen 
themselves saw to the fulfilment of their own 
statutes, at least in the days to which our observa- 
tions are confined, when gildhood was at its per- 
fection. In pursuance of the same gild princi- 
ple, that " every one shall have the same means of 
subsistence," and to procure especially the " bet- 
ter relief and comodytie of the poorer sorte," reg- 
ulations were carefully drawn up regarding the 
purchase of raw materials. The producer was 

3 Goldasti, " Constituttones Imperiales" IV, p. 189. Brentano, 
p. 60. 



1 88 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

not to begin the day with the knowledge that he 
was placed at any disadvantage in competing with 
a wealthier neighbor. In some of the German 
crafts the material needed for production was 
bought for the entire fellowship by gild members 
appointed for this office. Each gildsman could 
then supply himself, at a standard price, with the 
needed quantity of his material, and no one could 
exceed his allowance. 

If special opportunities of a bargain were of- 
fered to any individual member he was obliged, 
according to gild statutes, to give others a portion 
of his purchase, at the same rate, if so they de- 
sired it. Such, too, had been the custom in the 
early English merchant gilds. To make this ef- 
fective a special ordinance is even found forbid- 
ding him to keep his purchase secret. Thus the 
poorest gildsman could obtain the material for his 
craft at the same price and under the same ad- 
vantages as the richest. On this principle, too, 
common town purchases were frequently made 
and even common mills erected where all the 
wheat must be ground, that " thus the advantage 
of the poorer sort might be secured. " In other 
instances a trade in cattle and corn was carried 
on by the town authorities. There are many who 
in our own day would denounce such actions as 
Socialistic, although no one had heard in those 
days of " Das Capital" Capitalism itself did not 
exist on which Marx based his ponderous vol- 



LIVE AND LET LIVE 1 89 

umes. In the same manner cooperative selling, 
as in the case of the German potters, must not be 
considered a modern innovation. 

As for the working time, a six-hour day was 
never dreamed of by these old gildsmen, unless it 
might possibly have been the case in some very 
hazardous or exhausting occupation. The eight- 
hour day was not unknown. Ordinarily, how- 
ever, men worked without haste, and with proper 
intervals for rest and refection, so long as the 
daylight lasted, content and happy in their oc- 
cupation. There is no instance on record of any 
protest, on the part of journeymen or craftsmen, 
against the length of the working-day, though 
these old gildsmen were not slow to express their 
mind on subjects of gild interest. Neither, how- 
ever, was any one permitted to exceed the definite 
hours set respectively for winter and for sum- 
mer work. The object was again to prevent un- 
necessary competition and to preserve unimpaired 
the full dignity of man. 

The usual hours of labor may at first sight 
appear long to us, in comparison with modern 
standards. Yet we may be surprised to learn 
that one of the objections brought against the 
Middle Ages is the accusation that there were 
then too few working hours in the year. It is suf- 
ficient to answer that all the necessary work was 
well and duly done. 

The Sundays were sacred to religion, and all 



I90 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

the many Holy Days then enjoined by the Church 
were strictly enforced by the gild authorities. At 
six o'clock on Saturdays all industry ceased. In 
many gilds work ended with the first Vespers, at 
noon. In some instances this rule was observed 
not merely on Saturdays but also on the Vigils of 
the Feasts, which then were many in number. 
Men might so fittingly prepare themselves for the 
celebration of the high festivals of that Faith 
which was dearer far than life to those ancient 
gildsmen. To it they owed the privileges they 
possessed and all the honor and the dignity with 
which labor was encompassed. The master gilds- 
man needed not to envy King or noble. Religion 
gave to him his accolade, and every apprentice 
might hope in his good day to be a master. Writ- 
ing of Chartres Cathedral, where kings and dukes 
and barons are commemorated among the bene- 
factors, Ouin-Lacroix adds : " Des corporations 
de simples artisans y ont mele avec orgueil les em- 
blemes de leur profession." 4 The tools of the 
humblest laborers were not considered unworthy to 
be emblazoned with crown or coronet on those 
glorious stained-glass windows of the thirteenth 
century. 

The Socialist Paul Lafargue declared unchal- 
lenged before la Cour d f assises du Nord: " I 
say and I maintain, that under the old regime, the 

4 Histoire des Ancienncs Corporations d'ArU et Metiers et des 
Confreries Religieuses de la Capitate de La Normandie, pp. 6, 7. 



LIVE AND LET LIVE 191 

laborer was in a better position than to-day. The 
Church each year assured him fifty-two Sundays 
and thirty-eight holidays, a total of ninety days of 
rest." 5 

Whatever the actual number of Holy Days may 
really have been, the Church did far more than 
this for the workingman. She not only assured 
him the necessary rest and relaxation, but by the 
attendance at Holy Mass and other religious serv- 
ices kept him constantly in touch with the great 
spiritual realities of life and thus prevented that 
degradation of labor which is sure to follow in 
every pagan society. It was not mere idleness, 
but a sanctified day of rest that she procured for 
the humblest apprentice as well as for the master 
craftsman, and thus preserved in both all that is 
finest, noblest and highest in man. It is this that 
the false modern radicalism forgets in its unrea- 
sonable demands. 

The life of the Middle Ages, in their perfection, 
was a life of labor, of charity and of religion. 
But everywhere and throughout, it was a life of 
joy. In the beauty of so much of the most com- 
mon workmanship of those days we behold the de- 
light of the workman in his craft. But above all 
it is plain in the sacred monuments that he has 
left us of his skill and faith. It is written in every 
arch and spandrel, in every pinnacle and turret, 
in the carven tracery and richly varied harmonies 

5 Spoken after Vaffaire de Fourmies. 



192 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

of light and shade, in the fantastic gargoyles and 
grotesques no less than in the reverently sculp- 
tured saints and angels of the ancient minsters, 
where every artisan was gifted with an artist's 
soul and every artist was an artisan. The same 
was true of the very homes and shops of those 
ancient craftsmen. Though we read much in our 
day of the narrow medieval streets, and the over- 
hanging stories of their houses, crowded together 
within the high town walls, that naturally could 
not expand with every growth of the community, 
yet the richness of medieval life surpassed all that 
modern science has devised. Cities were then the 
centers of Christian culture, consisting of real 
homes, and filled with true men and women who 
knew that there were higher things in life than 
frantic production and mad greed for gain. This 
truth is strongly expressed in the work of two re- 
cent authorities upon the subject, J. L. Hammond 
and Barbara Hammond, who like Ruskin have 
penetrated beneath the surface of that medieval 
culture, so rich, so varied, so warm with life and 
love and faith: 

The old English towns were often over-crowded, insanitary, 
honey-combed with alleys and courts that never saw the sun or 
breathed the air, but the fancy, and emotion, and the skill and 
craftsmanship of different ages had made them beautiful and 
interesting. They were the home of a race, with all the tradi- 
tions and pieties and heirlooms of a home. It was of immense 
moment to the citizens of such towns whether the towns were 
beautiful, well-governed, and administered with justice and 



LIVE AND LET LIVE 1 93 

magnanimity: this mattered much more to them than half the 
wars that have filled so disproportionate a page in the writings 
of history. 6 

Comparing the new industrial districts of the 
age of capitalism with the towns of the medieval 
gildsmen, the same writers say of the former: 

They were not so much towns as barracks: not the refuge of 
a civilization but the barracks of an industry. This character 
was stamped on their form and life and government. The 
medieval town had reflected the minds of centuries and the 
subtle associations of a living society with a history; these towns 
reflected the violent enterprise of an hour, the single passion that 
had thrown street on street in a frantic monotony of disorder. 
Nobody could read in these shapeless improvisations what 
Ruskin called "the manly language of a people inspired by 
resolute and common purpose," for they represented nothing 
but the avarice of the jerry-builder catering to the avarice of 
the capitalist. 7 

The Coal Commission of England in 19 19 
showed that in one town alone 27,000 out of 38,- 
000 people were living in one or two-room houses ; 
in another, twenty-eight per cent of the popula- 
tion was living in houses of one room only. In 
Lanarkshire, out of 188,000 children born, 22,000 
died before they reached the age of one year. 8 
But what is all this compared to the slums of mod- 
ern cities as Francis Thompson knew and pic- 
tured them in terrible words, or Tennyson de- 
scribed them in the England of his day: 

8 The Town Laborer," p. 37. 

7 Ibid. 

8 The London Universe, March 21, 1919. 



194 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

There among the glooming alleys Progress halts on palsied feet, 
Crime and hunger cast our maidens by the thousands on the 

street. 
There the master scrimps his haggard sempstress of her daily 

bread, 
There a single sordid attic holds the living and the dead. 

It is with a sense of relief, therefore, that we 
turn back to those earlier and better days, and 
with Lowell dare to say: u I am not ashamed to 
confess a singular sympathy with the Middle 
Ages." 9 But to understand best the joy of life 
that filled them, we must turn to the craft gilds of 
those days : their gild-halls and their richly sculp- 
tured churches; their banners, pageants and plays; 
their feasts and banquets and rejoicings. No gild 
was ever without its festal gatherings when the 
hardy craftsmen sat about the common board, and 
cheer and merriment were universal. There is 
no gloom in the Catholic religion. It admits of 
the highest abnegation, but it never seeks to crush 
in others the life of innocent pleasure. Puritan- 
ism and rigorism became possible through the Re- 
formation only. Asceticism itself was not dour- 
ness, but joy of spirit. The cup of life was never 
so full to overflowing, for the greatest and the 
least, as in those days when gildhood was in 
flower. 

" A Few Bits of Roman Mosaic." 



CHAPTER XX 

THE GOLDEN RULE APPLIED 

THE salient characteristic of the gild ideal 
was its regard for the interests of the 
public. However the craftsman might 
personally fail, the statutes of his gild never over- 
looked the common good. Here precisely we can 
discover by contrast the great and fundamental 
defects of our modern organizations of labor and 
capital. Social obligations were never so deeply 
impressed on the minds of men as in the days 
when religion laid the economic basis for the med- 
ieval gilds. 

Of first importance was the quality of the work. 
A false conception of class loyalty is often likely 
to protect the modern member of an employers' or 
workmen's association who fails in this or any 
other regard. Even where flagrant offenses have 
been committed, such unions in countless instances 
have sought to shield their members from the 
just penalties to be inflicted. At times a patent 
conspiracy exists to promote the class interest at 
the expense of the public welfare. The medieval 
gild statutes, at their perfection, never dissociated 
these two, and the common welfare was in fact the 

195 



196 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

first to be regarded. Not in vain had the Church 
imbued the minds of these sturdy gildsmen with 
the principles of Catholic morality and her own 
sane interpretation of the Gospel law of social 
justice and of charity. Hence not only was care- 
ful investigation made by every gild into the 
quality of the goods produced by its own mem- 
bers, but even tools, according to one gild regula- 
tion, could not be used " unless the same were 
testified to be good and honest." Our modern 
pure food laws were anticipated and carried to a 
degree of perfection unknown to us. Night work, 
too, was prohibited for the precise reason that 
proper inspection was then impossible, frauds 
might readily be perpetrated and high class work 
could not be produced by inadequate light. 

The purchaser could always appeal to the gild 
for satisfaction if any article had been imper- 
fectly made, and he might probably find the gild 
officials even more eager than he to discover and 
right the wrong. Since the raw material of the 
tradesman was in many instances furnished by the 
consumer, special safeguards were provided to as- 
sure him that his goods would not be spoiled or 
wasted. Thus the Bristol craft of tailors or- 
dained that the work must be performed deftly 
and properly or the gild itself would see that the 
price paid for the cloth of a misfit garment was 
refunded to the customer, the garment remaining 
with the tailor. " So," the gild quaintly incul- 



THE GOLDEN RULE APPLIED 1 97 

cates its lesson, " every tailor shall be advised to 
cut well and sufficiently the cloth that is unto him 
delivered to be cut." 

Similarly all frauds in weight, width, measure 
or any established standard of quantity were 
promptly adjudged by the gild itself or brought by 
it to the notice of the municipal authorities. An 
instance of the latter kind is found in the statutes 
of the London bracemakers, known as " brae- 
lers," drawn up in 1355 : " If an Y one shall be 
found making false work, let the same work be 
brought before the mayor and aldermen, and be- 
fore them let it be adjudged upon as being false 
or forfeited; and let such person go bodily to 
prison." * It is to be noted that articles defective 
in measure or weight were then known as " false." 
Of the gild courts themselves enough has already 
been said in another chapter. The extent of their 
power naturally varied in different towns. But 
all weights and measures were carefully tested* 
particularly at the great fairs at which alone for- 
eign goods could be bought from foreign pro- 
ducers, although domestic goods, too, were sold 
on these occasions. The greatest care was doubt- 
less also taken on the fixed market days when the 
country produce was sold to the townsmen and 
the work of the craftsmen was bought by the 
farmers. 

The fact that legislation concerning fraud and 

1 Riley, " Memorials of London," p. 278. 



I98 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

deceit was sufficiently common in the Middle Ages 
is sometimes construed into an argument to prove 
the existence of a laxity of conscience. The same 
conclusion is drawn from the number of judg- 
ments passed in this matter. The very contrary 
however would seem to follow. It is only a high 
conception of rectitude that can insist upon the 
instant correction of even the lesser offenses that 
in more recent days were to be almost entirely 
overlooked, while the most flagrant abuses grew 
up unchecked under the capitalistic regime in most 
essential matters. A conscientious use of the pil- 
lory, as in the days of the old gildsmen, would 
have displayed a marvelous rogues' gallery in 
our public squares before the pure food laws some- 
what relieved these conditions. Nor did abuses 
end with them. We need but refer to the whole- 
sale deceits practised in the war by merchants and 
manufacturers of all nations. The contrast with 
the old-time gild regulations will enable us to ap- 
preciate better the watchfulness of the gildsmen 
and the high sense of righteousness exemplified in 
their gild statutes. 

We may in general accept, in this particular re- 
gard, the statement made by Stella Kramer in 
11 The English Craft Gilds and the Government," 
when she thus described their economic activities 
in the English boroughs : 

As administrators of the land's law they kept control over 
market regulations for this whole period. They saw that 



THE GOLDEN RULE APPLIED 1 99 

commodities were made of proper materials and that they con- 
formed to the standards of width, weight and measure. In case 
of fraud the consumer had redress from the gild tribunal as 
well as from that of the common law. But proceedings at the 
latter, for the ordinary breaches of market regulations, must 
have been rather unsatisfactory. Indeed, appeals on craft mat- 
ters to any courts other than those of the gilds were probably 
slow and cumbersome. The gild acted essentially, not as a law- 
making body, but as an administratory organ interested in the 
maintenance of certain standards of production and the enforce- 
ment of certain rules for market transactions, and its officers 
were commissioned to bring transgressors to speedy justice. 
But it could enforce no laws without the approval and coopera- 
tion of the local powers. Above the local magnate stood the 
State, occasionally issuing national regulations, which also the 
gild took upon itself to execute (p. 137). 

The power of gild initiative doubtless differed 
greatly in various towns, and even much more so 
in the various countries. It would seem reason- 
able that gild statutes should not have been given 
a power of control, which really amounted to civil 
law, until they had received the sanction of mu- 
nicipal or State authority. It was sufficient that 
Crown and municipality recognized their import- 
ance and fully acknowledged them " as organs in 
control of every-day market transactions." This 
the author absolutely admits and adds : " In prac- 
tice, State, borough and gild presented frequently 
the appearance of a three-fold combination work- 
ing together for a common end. It is therefore 
not always easy to consider the gilds apart as dis- 
tinct organs with their own special purposes and 
functions." (p. 143.) This sufficiently illustrates 



200 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

both the great power of craft gilds and their aim 
to secure in all things the common good of the 
entire community and not their own class interests 
as distinct from this and opposed to it. At their 
height of development they best illustrate the 
golden rule reduced to practice. They are the 
safest and the sanest model of true Christian de- 
mocracy in the realm of industry. 

Of greatest importance was the regulation by 
the gilds not merely of the process of manufac- 
ture, but also of its amount, wherever this was 
necessary. Thus over-production and unemploy- 
ment were alike prevented by the wise gildsmen. 
This was made possible, among other ways, by 
preventing a surplus of apprentices within any 
given trade and encouraging a greater number to 
interest themselves in the crafts that needed de- 
velopment. Other means were employed to avoid 
temporary over-production while the workers and 
their families were never starving because of sea- 
sons of unemployment. 

The problem of woman labor was met with 
equal wisdom, and woman enjoyed her true place 
and esteem. Where she chose the function of 
wife and mother the gild enabled her to perform 
it in all its perfection. So there was work and 
bread for all. 

To prevent underselling or unfair competition 
and at the same time to protect both the consumer 
and the producer, prices too were strictly regu- 



THE GOLDEN RULE APPLIED 201 

lated. The method was simplicity itself. A fair 
value was set upon the raw material, knd a fair 
reward was assigned for the labor normally re- 
quired to produce the finished work of craftsman- 
ship. So much and no more the consumer could 
be reasonably expected to pay. So much and no 
more the producer could reasonably ask to re- 
ceive for his work. There was no middleman to 
absorb the profits. To use improper methods of 
advertising and to entice away another craftsman's 
customer was an offense that met with severe pun- 
ishment. Not in his very dreams could the old 
gildsmen have conceived of the modern school of 
advertising when every article made is the best 
in the market, and all others are inferior in qual- 
ity or poor imitations, against which a gullible 
public is solicitously warned by the solemn caution: 
" Beware of imitations." Honesty and merit 
were to be the only qualities by which a buyer was 
to be attracted to the craftsman's little shop. Su- 
perior skill in workmanship was to be the one ad- 
vertisement. 

By these methods — which are to be copied in 
principle, though not literally, by us — prices were 
kept within the reach of all and the extreme suf- 
ferings brought upon modern civilization by the 
constantly recurring high cost of living were then 
unknown. Even so prejudiced a writer as Henry 
Hallam reluctantly makes the following signifi- 
cant admission: 



202 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

There is one very unpleasing remark which every one wlio 
attends to the subject of prices will be induced to make, that the 
laboring classes, especially those engaged in agriculture, were 
better provided with the means of subsistence in the reign of 
Edward III or of Henry IV than they are at present. In the 
fourteenth century, Sir John Cullum observes, a harvest man 
had four pence a day, which enabled him in a week to buy a 
comb of wheat. But to buy a comb of wheat a man must now 
(1784) work ten or twelve days. (History of Hawsted, p. 228.) 
So under Henry VI, if meat was at a farthing and a half a 
pound, which I suppose was about the truth, a laborer earning 
threepence a day, or eighteen pence a week, could buy a bushel 
of wheat at six shillings the quarter and twenty-four pounds of 
meat for his family. A laborer at present, earning twelve 
shillings a week, can only buy half a bushel of wheat at eighty 
shillings the quarter, and twelve pounds of meat at seven- 
pence. • . . After every allowance has been made, I should find 
it difficult to resist the conclusion that, however the laborer has 
derived benefit from the cheapness of manufactured commodities 
and from many inventions of common utility, he is much inferior 
in ability to support a family to his ancestors three or four 
centuries ago. 2 

The comparison here applied to the respective 
periods in which Cullum and Hallam wrote their 
histories is stated by J. E. T. Rogers to have held 
true already in the early days of the Reformation. 
" The masses of the people" as he says in his 
11 History of Agricultural Prices in England M (I, 
p. 10), u were losers by the Reformation" It 
became necessary to pass twelve Acts of Parlia- 
ment between 1541 and 1601 " with the distinct 
object of providing relief against destitution." 

2 " View of the State of Europe during the Middle Ages," 
II, pp. 814-816. (Appleton.) 



THE GOLDEN RULE APPLIED 203 

But there is still another way in which the Gold- 
en Rule was applied by the craft gilds. It would 
be impossible to enumerate the countless works 
of charity performed by them. In this particular 
too there was a wonderful similarity among the 
gilds of every Catholic country. Craft gilds and 
more or less purely religious gilds here worked 
side by side. Not only were comfort and relief 
generously afforded to poor gild brethren and sis- 
ters, sick members visited, the dead religiously 
buried at the gild expense, and prayers and Masses 
offered for their souls, but the poor of the entire 
city were remembered by the gilds, cottages for 
the old and indigent were erected and charitable 
institutions of every kind called into being. Thus 
St. Job's Hospital for small-pox was founded at 
Hamburg by a gild of fishmongers, shop-keepers 
and hucksters. 3 Free loans and gifts to those in 
need or to the young seeking an opportunity for 
self-support, doweries for indigent girls, assist- 
ance to the imprisoned or such as were overtaken 
by misfortunes of any kind, lodging for pilgrims 
and the offering of purses to enable them to con- 
tinue their pilgrimages to distant shrines or to the 
Holy Places — these were some of the many com- 
mon charities practised by the tradesmen through 
their crafts and brotherhoods. Roads and 
bridges were repaired by them, schools supported, 
churches renewed or entirely built, and splendid 

3 Janssen. 



204 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

vestments, gloriously illumined missals, jeweled 
chalices and waxen candles for shrines or serv- 
ices abundantly supplied. In the stately gild- 
halls, such as were erected by all the more pros- 
perous crafts, the poor were banqueted upon the 
special religious feast-days of the gilds. There 
was no want or suffering to which human nature 
may fall heir that was not relieved in as truly a 
scientific as a Christian manner by gild and mon- 
astery. 

The spirit of religion and brotherhood that 
went hand in hand to form the first and only true 
industrial democracy of the world's history, em- 
bodied in these craft gilds at their perfection, is 
thus accurately described by Lujo Brentano: 

All had particular saints for their patrons, after whom the 
society was frequently called, and where it was possible, they 
chose one who had some relation to their trade. They founded 
Masses, altars, and painted windows in cathedrals; and even at 
the present day their coats of arms and their gifts range proudly 
by the side of those of kings and barons. Sometimes individual 
craft gilds appear to have stood in special relations to a par- 
ticular church, by virtue of which they had to perform special 
services and received in turn a special share in all the prayers 
of the clergy of that church. In later times the craft gilds fre- 
quently went in solemn procession to their churches. We find 
innumerable ordinances also as to the support of the sick and 
the poor, and to afford a settled asylum for distress the London 
companies very early built dwellings near their halls. The 
chief care of the gildsmen was always directed to the welfare 
of the souls of the dead. Every year a Requiem was sung for 
all departed gild brothers, when they were all mentioned by 
name, and on the death of any member special services were 



THE GOLDEN RULE APPLIED 205 

held for his soul and distribution of alms was made to the 
poor, who in return had to offer up prayers for the dead. 4 

To complete the picture given here of the so- 
cial and religious service of the gilds it will suf- 
fice to quote the words of Dr. Jessop. The gilds, 
he wrote in the Nineteenth Century, referring in 
general to all these medieval organizations: 

Were benefit clubs, they were saving banks, they were social 
unions, and, like every other association of the Middle Ages, 
they were religious bodies, so religious that they were con- 
tinually building special chapels for themselves, and they had 
chaplains of their own who received a regular stipend. Fre- 
quently they were splendidly provided with magnificent copes 
and banners and hangings and large store of costly chalices and 
jeweled service books used on festive occasions in the worship 
of the gild chapels; and I have never met with the least indi- 
cation that the gilds were at any moment other than solvent. 5 

In proportion as this spirit of Christian Faith 
was living and active in the gilds of the Middle 
Ages did they realize in its fulness the golden 
rule of the Gospel's precept of brotherly love. 

4 " History and Development of Gilds," pp. 69, 70. 

5 March, 1898. 



CHAPTER XXI 

LEARNING A TRADE 

CONSIDERABLE attention has been given 
in our day to the problem of apprentice- 
ship. Never was this so perfectly 
solved as in the days of the medieval crafts. Ap- 
prenticeship was one of the wisest and most im- 
portant gild institutions of the Middle Ages. It 
was meant to be a religious and moral, as well 
as an economic schooling for the future crafts- 
man. It was in effect a striking application of 
the principle of brotherhood and mutual help- 
fulness everywhere taught by the Church. 

No similar institution is known in all preced- 
ing history. Individualism was the marked char- 
acteristic of ancient paganism as of modern liber- 
alism. In spite of the workingmen's unions 
which for centuries existed in ancient Greece and 
Rome there was no systematic attempt at trade 
education. The task was left to the individual. 
There was neither joy nor dignity in labor. It 
was regarded as fit for the slave only. Cathol- 
icity restored it to honor, and gave it those high 
ideals which were first to be fully developed under 

the aegis of the Church in the Middle Ages. 

206 



LEARNING A TRADE 207 

The rudimentary conceptions of brotherhood 
which paganism contained, and which were per- 
haps nowhere more perfectly expressed than in 
its gild life, were not sufficient to abolish the 
stigma which rested upon labor. It was only 
when the Son of God Himself came in the Per- 
son of a Laborer, that men recognized the full 
sacredness of toil and its appointed place in the 
plan of Providence. Jesus Himself was the Di- 
vine Apprentice. The Builder of the universe 
learned in all obedience the trade of a carpenter 
in the shop of Joseph, His foster-father. 

The first trade schools where the crafts were 
systematically taught, where apprenticeship and 
industrial training may be said to have begun, 
were the monasteries. The monks themselves 
were the first great master craftsmen. Ova et 
labora, " Labor and pray," was their motto. 

With the development of the craft gilds the in- 
stitution of apprenticeship likewise gradually came 
into being. It was not at first obligatory and 
men might be admitted to a gild and the practice 
of a trade upon the testimony of the craft officials, 
provided the latter had carefully assured them- 
selves of the proficiency of the candidates. In 
the course of time this alternative was no longer 
accepted; but the term of apprenticeship and the 
conditions under which it was to be made varied 
largely for the different countries or even for the 
different trades themselves. An English ordi- 



208 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

nance of 1261 forbids having an apprentice for 
less than ten years. 1 This was considerably more 
than the ordinary period. Soon seven years came 
to be received as the normal length of apprentice- 
ship in England. " No apprentice shall be re- 
ceived for a less term than seven years," was the 
London ordinance. A similar rule obtained in 
France, although the term still varied largely. 
Five or six years as " prentice M was the Scotch 
gild law, " and one year for meat and fee." 2 
During this time a complete knowledge of the 
trade was to be acquired. 

The temptation might naturally arise to turn 
apprenticeship into child labor, but this the gild 
regulations strenuously combated. No one, more- 
over, was to practise a trade without having first 
been apprenticed. So the English gild of Leather- 
sellers ordained that: " From henceforth no one 
shall set any man, child, or woman to work in the 
trade if such person be not first bound appren- 
tice, and enrolled in the trade." The master's 
own wife and children might of course be of as- 
sistance to him. 3 

In Germany the period of apprenticeship varied 
from two to six years; but in addition to this 

1 " Liber Custumarum," 536. 

2 Bain, " Merchant and Craft Gilds," p. 204. 

3 W. J. Ashley, u English Economic History and Theory," 
Part II, p. 84. 



LEARNING A TRADE 209 

there was imposed upon the young journeyman, 
who had just completed his term, the obligation 
of traveling, and practising his trade abroad. 
These years of " wandering " were to give him 
experience and varied knowledge of his craft. 
They were meant to be the completion of his 
technical education. This practice, though like- 
wise observed in France, was not known in Eng- 
land. During the term of apprenticeship proper, 
the remuneration, if any, was frequently insignifi- 
cant. In many instances it was very slight in the 
beginning of the term and regularly increased with 
the years. It was often, however, no more than 
the equivalent of a modest allowance of pocket 
money. In some cases the apprentice after con- 
cluding his term was to remain with his master for 
another year at a set wage. Tools, food and 
other necessaries, often including also clothing of 
a stipulated kind, were furnished by the master. 

Apprenticeship was the novitiate of the crafts- 
man. It was even preceded in many instances by 
a probation, as we find was the case in Germany 
where frequently a full month was required for 
this preliminary test of fitness. The youth to be 
admitted was moreover to have been born in 
honest wedlock, for it was not considered befitting 
that any one should be a master craftsman whose 
fair name was blemished by even the slightest 
stain. Everywhere the general principle was re- 



2IO DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

ceived that the artisan who would aspire to the 
dignity of masterhood must hold his reputation as 
sacred as the honor of a king. 

The admission therefore into this gild novitiate 
was often conducted with the most impressive 
ceremonies. It took place in the gildhall before 
the assembled masters, or even in the town hall 
itself in presence of the public authorities. The 
apprentice now solemnly pledged himself " to 
begin his future calling in the name of God, to be 
obedient, faithful and attentive to his master, and 
by his moral conduct to render himself worthy of 
becoming in time a worthy member of the gild 
and of civil society." 4 His name was then en- 
rolled among the gild apprentices. Such import- 
ance was given to this function when the gilds 
were in their perfection. 

The young apprentice now lived in the master's 
house as a member of the family. He was to be 
subject to his master in fidelity and obedience as 
a son to his father, and was to receive a corre- 
sponding care and attention in return. Nothing 
was to be kept secret from him that might further 
him in his trade. But above all he was to be 
protected with scrupulous watchfulness, so that, 
like his Divine Model, he might advance in wis- 
dom and grace as well as in age. His moral con- 
duct and his observance of religious duties were 
to be foremost in the master's eye. If in any 

4 Huber-Libenau, p. 23. 



LEARNING A TRADE 211 

way he failed he was to be chastised, " so that 
through the pain of the body the soul may re- 
ceive good." In the good old days men did not 
believe in our modern educational principle of 
sparing the rod and spoiling the child. In France, 
however, there was a special rule that he must 
not be beaten by the master's wife. The English 
statutes require that he be chastised " duly, but 
not otherwise." 

The true spirit of apprenticeship, as inculcated 
by the Church, is nowhere more beautifully ex- 
pressed than in the book of " Christian Exhorta- 
tion": 

No trade or profession can succeed honorably unless the 
apprentice is early taught to fear God, and to be obedient to 
his master as if he were his father. He must, morning and 
evening and during his work, beg God's help and protection, 
for without God he can do nothing; no protection of men is of 
avail without the protection of God, and often even hurtful 
to the soul. Every Sunday and holy day he must hear Mass 
and sermon and read good books. He must be industrious and 
seek not his own glory, but God's. The honor of his master 
and of his trade he must also seek, for this is holy, and he may 
one day be master himself if God wills and he is worthy of it. 5 

The duties of the master are laid down with 
no less discernment: 

The master must not be weak-hearted towards the apprentice, 
but neither must he be tyrannical nor too exacting, as often 
happens. The master shall protect the apprentice from railler- 
ies, ear-pullings, and abuse from the journeymen. Masters, 

5 Janssen, " History of the German People," II, p. 20. 



212 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

think of your duties. The apprentice has been entrusted to you 
by the gild to care for his soul and body according to the laws 
of God and the corporation. You must account for your ap- 
prentice and care for him as if he were your own son. You are 
not master only to govern and to do masterwork, but also to 
command yourself as Christianity and your trade require. Re- 
member, masters, you must be an example to your wife and 
children, to your apprentices and servants. 6 

The gild did not fail, as the historian remarks, 
to provide the young man with securities against 
an unworthy master. As the bans are proclaimed 
before marriage in the Catholic Church, so before 
an apprentice was committed to a gildsman the 
question was asked in the full assembly of the 
craft if any fault could be found with the future 
master either as a Christian or a craftsman. 
Again when the term of service was over the ap- 
prentice was publicly to bring his charges, if any 
injustice had been done him, or else " remain for- 
ever silent." He was now amid further solem- 
nities freed from his obligations to his former 
master and furnished with his diploma. His 
status, however, was not perfect until, in later 
times, he had been received into the brotherhood 
of journeymen, a reception which took place amid 
much merriment, but not unaccompanied by seri- 
ous admonitions and sage and religious advice. 

Like all human institutions the system of ap- 
prenticeship was subject to abuses which rapidly 
accumulated in the days of religious decline and 

c ibid. 



LEARNING A TRADE 213 

of the Reformation. The term of apprentice- 
ship was at times made unconscionably long, ex- 
tending in England to as many as twelve years. 
In France it varied from two to twelve years. 7 
In Germany, where the indenture was for a lesser 
period than in England, the years of " wander- 
ing M were often unduly prolonged. They were 
known to extend even over seven years and more. 

Technical skill was evidently not the only ob- 
ject where such conditions prevailed. Care, too, 
was taken at a later date to exclude those of 
11 villein estate or condition." Attempts were 
made in the reigns of Richard II and Henry IV 
to prevent the vast emigration from country to 
town by legislating that children who had been 
employed upon the farm until the age of twelve 
were to remain in that occupation. 

Strict limitations were set regarding the num- 
ber of apprentices that could be employed by a 
single master. It usually varied, according to the 
different periods or conditions, from one to three. 
In later years, with the more complete develop- 
ment of industry and commerce, a certain propor- 
tion was to be preserved between the number of 
apprentices and journeymen. The reason was 
evident. Apprenticeship was then degenerating 
into child labor and the adult workingmen were 
obliged to protest in self-defense. Before this 
stage had been attained, however, the object of 

7 Boileau, u Livre des Metiers" 



214 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

limitation had been to provide a good technical 
training and later to avoid an overcrowding in 
the various provinces of skilled labor. The true 
gild idea was that no master should have more 
apprentices than he could properly " keep, in- 
form, teach and maintain," that he might make 
of them good craftsmen and excellent Christians. 

Towards the end of the reign of Richard II 
a distinction began to be drawn between the 
wealthier and the more indigent gilds, the mem- 
bers of the former gaining a political as well as 
social predominance, and being privileged to 
wear a special livery. 8 In 1489 we meet with 
a regulation enacted in London by which the gilds- 
men " out of clothing," i. e., not wearing liveries, 
might employ one apprentice and no more, except 
they had good reason for complaint, while those 
11 of the clothing " might have two apprentices 
and no more. He who had been warden might 
have three, and the upper warden, four. 9 These 
distinctions were henceforth to become more ac- 
centuated, and the name of " crafts " and " mys- 
teries " came into common use in place of " gilds." 

Another sign of decline was the levying of 
large fees both upon the entrance to apprentice- 
ship and to mastership. Such abuses, too, reached 
their climax in the post-Reformation days, while 
they were unheard of in the period of true gild 

8 William Herbert, " Livery Companies of London," pp. 36, 37. 
• Williams, " Founders," p. 11. 



LEARNING A TRADE 215 

development. " It was a great matter in for- 
mer times to give £10 to bind an apprentice," says 
Stowe, referring even then to the days of the de- 
cline, M but in King James Fs time they gave £20, 
£40, £60 and sometimes £100 with an apprentice. 
But now these prices are vastly enhanced to 
£500, or £600, or £800." 10 Brentano remarks 
that reference is probably made here to the 
Twelve Great Companies. 

Finally the famous Statute of Apprentices, 
drawn up in " the spacious days " of good 
" Queen Bess," and technically known as " 5 Eliz. 
cap. 4," sought to reinstate the institution of ap- 
prenticeship which had then largely fallen into 
disuse. It was at last to be replaced, under the 
old name, by pure child labor. The hours of 
work were fixed by her at twelve, as a minimum; 
but a labor day of fifteen and sixteen hours was 
not considered unnatural for children in their 
teens by the new Individualism in which the 
Reformation culminated on its economic side. 
Pauperism, which arose at the same time, was to 
extend its abhorrent effects equally to the unhappy 
little ones. Says Professor Hayes of Columbia: 

There was a law by which pauper children could be forced 
to work, and under this law thousands of poor children, five 
and six years old, were taken from their homes, sent from 
parish to parish to work in factories, and bought and sold in 
gangs like slaves. In the factories they were set to work with- 

10 Ed. 1720, p. 329. 



2l6 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

out pay, the cheapest of food being all they could earn. If they 
refused to work irons were put around their ankles, and they 
were chained to the machine, and at night they were locked up 
in the sleeping huts. The working day was long — from five 
or six in the morning until nine or ten at night. Often the chil- 
dren felt their arms ache with fatigue and their eyelids grow 
heavy with sleep, but they were kept awake by the whip of the 
overseer. Many of the little children died of over-work, and 
others were carried off by diseases which were bred by filth, fa- 
tigue and insufficient food. 11 

Boys and girls alike were subjected to the same 
slavery. " Harnessed and chained like dogs to 
go-carts," as another writer says, " these poor 
little slaves might be seen half-naked and ill-fed 
crawling on all fours dragging after them the 
coal-trucks filled/' So hour after hour they made 
their way through the dark, low tunnels of the 
coal pits. " But why did not the churches inter- 
fere?" asks Father Vaughan. "I am afraid," 
he is obliged to answer, " that the established 
Church at the time was on the side of capital. 
Methodism was all for Quietism, while the Cath- 
olic Church had not yet emerged in England from 
her catacombs. She was hardly allowed to live, 
let alone to utter." 12 Voices like those of Mrs. 
Browning were at a later date to arouse the land: 

The young lambs are bleating in the meadows; 
The young birds are chirping in the nest; 

11 Carlton J. H. Hayes, " A Political and Social History of 
Europe," Ii, pp. 85, 86. 

12 London Universe, May 3, 1918. 



LEARNING A TRADE 217 

The young fawns are playing with the shadows; 

The young flowers are blooming toward the west — 
But the young, young children, O my brothers, 

They are weeping bitterly! 
They are weeping in the playtime of the others, 

In the country of the free. 13 

Anti-slavery orators dilated eloquently upon 
the miseries of the negroes, while the children of 
Englishmen at home, as Sir Robert Peel said in 
18 16, " torn from their beds were compelled to 
work, at the age of six years, from early morn 
till late at night, a space of perhaps fifteen or six- 
teen hours," under the lashes of even more heart- 
less slave-masters. Such was the institution that 
had replaced the apprenticeship system of the 
Catholic gilds of the Middle Ages. 

The possibility of a system of apprenticeship 
such as existed in the best days of the medieval 
gilds is indeed no longer to be realized. But it 
does not follow that we cannot apply their prin- 
ciples in our own times, by a true craft educa- 
tion, combined with morality and religion. Chris- 
tian schools are here, as elsewhere, of the high- 
est importance. Unfortunately a vast propor- 
tion of the industrial output under capitalism has 
been such that articles were made merely to sell 
at the biggest profit. Perfect and durable work 
was often not even desired. The joy and satis- 
faction of expert craftsmanship could no longer 

13 " The Cry of the Children." 



2l8 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

be realized in the specialized factory work, re- 
quiring only a momentary instruction. Entire 
classes of skilled labor were cast helpless upon 
the labor market by the invention of new ma- 
chinery. Yet a wide field remains for the expert 
and the craftsman. For the rest, we must take 
modern conditions as we find them and seek to re- 
produce, so far as we can, the spirit of joy, char- 
ity, justice and religion that were found in the 
crafts when gildhood and brotherhood were still 
in their perfection. The teachings of Chris- 
tianity are for all time and can never become ob- 
solete or inapplicable in any rightful system of in- 
dustry adapted to the existing periods of economic 
development. Under no circumstances must fac- 
tory and workshop be permitted to become schools 
of immorality and irreligion, where heart and in- 
tellect alike are perverted and the whole man is 
degraded to a level that makes him the fit tool of 
godless agitators and anarchistic revolutionists. 

With the conscientiousness of the medieval 
gildsman we must watch over our youth, preserv- 
ing for them their true inheritance and opening 
to them their just opportunities both industrially 
and religiously. In their program of " Social 
Reconstruction," the American Bishops thus ex- 
pressed their attitude towards the particular mod- 
ern phase of this subject known as vocational 
training, showing their keen interest no less in the 



LEARNING A TRADE 219 

intellectual than in the religious and physical wel- 
fare of the laborer and his children: 

The need of industrial or, as it has come to be more generally 
called, vocational training is now universally acknowledged. 
In the interest of the nation, as well as in that of the workers 
themselves, this training should be made substantially univer- 
sal. While we can not now discuss the subject in any detail, 
we do wish to set down two general observations. First, the 
vocational training should be offered in such forms and condi- 
tions as not to deprive the children of the working classes of at 
least the elements of a cultural education. A healthy democracy 
can not tolerate a purely industrial or trade education for any 
class of its citizens. We do not want to have the children of the 
wage earners put into a special class in which they are marked 
as outside the sphere of opportunities for culture. The second 
observation is that the system of vocational training should not 
operate so as to weaken in any degree our parochial schools or 
any other class of private schools. Indeed, the opportunities of 
the system should be extended to all qualified private schools 
on exactly the same basis as to public schools. We want neither 
class divisions in education nor a State monopoly of education. 

The question of education naturally suggests the subject of 
child labor. Public opinion in the majority of the States of our 
country has set its face inflexibly aganst the continuous employ- 
ment of children in industry before the age of 16 years. Within 
a reasonably short time all of our States, except some stagnant 
ones, will have laws providing for this reasonable standard. 14 

So, from first to last, has the Catholic Church 
ever been eager to champion the interests of the 
working classes, beginning with their earliest edu- 
cation and devoting herself to them unstintedly 
with all her zeal and love. 

14 January 1, 1819. 



CHAPTER XXII 

THE FIRST MODERN LABOR CLASS 

CRAFTSMEN, apprentices and journeymen 
formed the triple alliance of labor in the 
Middle Ages. All these classes did not 
however spring into being at once, and it was long 
before they had developed into distinct parts of 
a complete gild system. Apprenticeship was al- 
ready becoming a necessary preliminary for mas- 
tership while the journeymen were as yet rarely 
mentioned in the gild statutes. As a class, they 
may be said to have come into existence during 
the fourteenth century. The most detailed ref- 
erence is made to them in the German gild statutes 
of the middle of this century, at which time they 
also first appeared in England as a definite body 
of workers with distinct interests. They were 
then variously known as yeomen, journeymen, 
valets or servants. The German Geselle and the 
French compagnon express more perfectly the in- 
timate relation of fellowship and family associa- 
tion that existed between master and journeyman. 

Of the three grades within the gild system, the 
journeymen alone corresponded, in a certain de- 
gree, to the modern laborer. Yet even this cor- 
respondence was vague and entirely wanting in 

220 



THE FIRST MODERN LABOR CLASS 221 

the beginning, when the journeyman, though la- 
boring for wages under an employer, was really 
looking forward to the day when he would open 
his little shop in one of the narrow, winding streets 
of his own cherished town, and be honored as mas- 
ter gildsman. 

The reason for the rise of a journeyman class 
is obvious. It was not always possible or desir- 
able for the apprentice, upon completing his ap- 
pointed term, to practise his craft as an independ- 
ent master. Hence he would often remain for a 
space of years as an assistant to his former mas- 
ter or to some other craftsman in need of his serv- 
ice. The number of these journeymen was at 
first comparatively small and their condition one 
of the closest intimacy with their employers. The 
journeyman was as the elder son of the family in 
which he lived and worked. In dress and conduct 
he was obliged to do honor to the gild, even as 
the master's wife was to sustain the fair name of 
his craft by her virtue and decorum. Both jour- 
neymen and apprentices were under the protec- 
tion of the craft gild. 

The journeyman, in brief, was looked upon as a 
member of the household for whose conduct and 
religious behavior the master was accountable be- 
fore God. The same responsibility was consid- 
ered to rest upon the gild itself. Gambling, late 
hours and worse vices on the part of the journey- 
man could not therefore be ignored by the mas- 



22 2 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

ter, and were strictly guarded against by the gild 
rules. Disobedience or irreverent behavior were 
to be seriously punished. Since, at this early pe- 
riod, the journeyman was bound to live beneath 
the master's roof and was hardly less incorporated 
into his family than the apprentice himself, it nat- 
urally followed that he could not be married. 
Thus a statute of the Bakers' Gild of Mainz, 1352, 
reads: " We are agreed that whatsover journey- 
man marries a housewife is no longer to be kept 
by his master than his contract lasts. He should 
then pay for his shop (er enkeuffe danne den 
marcket) and become master." * 

Such regulations can be readily understood, if 
we remember, as was already stated, that the jour- 
neyman, like the apprentice, was merely in a tran- 
sitional stage of his career which would last only 
until he could becomingly provide for a family in 
a manner to bring honor to himself and credit 
to his gild. In France such a transitional stage, 
known as le compagnonnage, was made a definite 
condition for mastership towards the end of the 
fourteenth century.. The journeyman might, 
however, freely choose his master and freely make 
his terms, in so far as these were not regulated by 
gild statutes. Like the master himself, he might 
count on gild assistance in his need. 2 The time 

1 Bohmer, "Beitrdge zur Geschichte des Zunf fives ens." 

2 £tienne Martin Saint-Leon, " Histoire des Corporations de 
Metiers." 



THE FIRST MODERN LABOR CLASS 223 

would soon come when he would marry and be- 
come an independent master craftsman. He could 
then set up his own shop, take his place in the 
gildhall and be honored in the land, until the in- 
signia of his trade would at last be laid upon his 
grave, and the prayers of his brethren and the 
Masses offered for his soul by them would be pre- 
sented at the Throne of God. Nor would his 
family be forgotten, if through any misfortune 
he left them in want, since the charity of the gild 
would provide for them. 

Nowhere perhaps is the Christian spirit of 
these early gilds more evident than in some of the 
regulations made by the gild masters for the wages 
of their assistants. Thus while the master tilers 
of London, according to the regulations drawn 
up in 1350, were to receive 5^d. a day during 
summer, and 4j^d. in winter, their journeymen 
were allowed 3^d. during the longer season and 
3d. during, the shorter. Considering the addi- 
tional burdens resting on the master worker, and 
understanding that both labored equally hard and 
long, the division of the payment may well be con- 
sidered adequate. Even better terms were made 
by the master daubers, to whose 5d. and 4d. cor- 
responded the 3^d. and 3d. of their garqons or 
journeymen. 3 Since the master and his assistants 
usually worked to the order of their customers, 
except in seasons of lax trade, provisions were 

* H. T. Riley, " Memorials of London," p. 251. 



2 24 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

often contained in the gild statutes of this period 
that payment must be made directly to the journey- 
man by the party engaging his services, and not 
through the master. By a particular arrangement 
the Builders of Nurnberg, both masters and jour- 
neymen, stood immediately under the city council, 
were equally independent, and received equal 
wages. 4 At the head of the stone-masons stood 
a skilled monk, who drew the plans and supervised 
the buildings. No difficulties occurred in the cities 
where these conditions prevailed until the monas- 
tery leadership passed into the hands of secular 
masters. Even then the old traditions were not 
entirely lost. 5 

But we now come to a period when the number 
of journeymen was growing larger and capital be- 
came of greater consequence. The time arrived 
when it was not possible for every journeyman to 
become a master. Such men could obviously no 
longer remain part of the master's family and must 
provide their own homes. They alone correspond 
to the laboring class of later years. 6 Hence the 
reason for a new form of organization: the jour- 
neymen gilds. These arose at the end of the four- 
teenth century, and under the name of Gcsselenver- 
bande became well nigh universal in Germany. 

4 Georg Schanz, " Zur Geschichte der deutschen Gesellen-Ver- 
bdnde," pp. 67, 68. 

■ Ibid. 

ft W. J. Ashley, "Introduction to English Economic History," 
II, pp. 101, 102. 



THE FIRST MODERN LABOR CLASS 225 

They were wide-spread also throughout France, 
England and western Europe in general, but the 
contrast and often the conflict between masters' 
gilds and journeymen gilds was most marked in 
Germany. In England these gilds, where they 
survived, seem finally to have become merely sub- 
sidiary organs to the masters 1 organizations. 7 

When these new institutions first appeared in 
their full strength the deterioration of the roas- 
ters' gilds had already begun. The great influx 
of country population into the towns had helped, 
economically, to aggravate the situation. The 
craft gilds themselves were slowly entering upon a 
policy of exclusiveness. Entrance fees were raised 
until in later days they often became extravagant. 
In the meantime comparatively slight fees were 
exacted from those belonging to the gildsmen's 
own families. In some instances membership be- 
came hereditary. Thus a monopoly might be 
created by the leading families. Entire classes 
were excluded by various legislations from even 
entering upon apprenticeship. Such laws were at 
times directed by the State itself against the chil- 
dren who had, for a certain period at least, worked 
upon the farms. Their object was to prevent the 
depopulation of the agricultural sections. In Ger- 
many, France and Scotland the execution of a 
masterpiece was demanded of the journeyman be- 
fore he could be admitted to the craft gild. 

7 Gross. 



226 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

Hence the chef d'auvre. 8 The idea was in itself 
excellent, but with the decline of the gilds the con- 
ditions set were at times such as to make this task 
not merely difficult, but very costly, while the ar- 
ticle produced was often unsaleable. To this was 
added in Germany the expensive Meisteressen, or 
inauguratory dinner, after the journeyman had 
completed his prescribed years of traveling and 
produced his Meisterstuck* 

Such were some of the abuses that arose as the 
influence of the Church was lessened and her prin- 
ciples of charity and social justice were in part dis- 
regarded. The climax was reached with the Ref- 
ormation and the years that followed. Thus at 
Strassburg, the center of the new religion, as 
Schanz recounts, the holidays were cut off, wages 
instead of being raised between Christmas and 
St. James's Day were lowered and other restric- 
tions were enacted. 10 Cromwell abolished the 
feasts of Christmas, Easter, " and other festivals 
called holidays," as superstitious. The fixed 
11 play days M given later were no adequate sub- 
stitute. 

11 The Reformation," says Bruno Schoenlank, 
a foremost non-Catholic authority upon this sub- 
ject, " was drawing its social conclusions, the 
golden age of the laborer was coming to an end, 

8 £tienr.e Martin Saint-Leon, op. cit., p. 92. 

Lugo Brentano, " History and Development of Gilds." 

10 Georg Schanz, op. cit., pp. 56-66. 



THE FIRST MODERN LABOR CLASS 227 

capitalism began to bestir itself." There was a 
tightening of the autocracy of the State regime. 
The free holidays of Catholic times were done 
away with. Journeyimen " were obliged to pro- 
duce a far greater amount of work, without hav- 
ing their wages raised. They were strained far 
more than before and were far more intensively 
exploited." Difficulties of every kind were put in 
their way that they might not become masters, 
and their right to marry was unconscionably post- 
poned. Thus according to a decree of October 
9, 1 6 13, the pamphlet-maker journeymen were 
not to marry until they had practiced their trade 
twelve years without interruption. Any one vio- 
lating this law was to be " entirely deposed from 
his trade and might never again be helped to re- 
sume it." Finally the silk-weavers' journeymen 
were commanded by the Niirnberg city council, 
about 1650, to observe " the fear of God and a 
fifteen-hour work day." Such was the economic 
result of the Reformation, as vouched for by Prot- 
estant and other non-Catholic authorities. 11 

The journeymen gilds began as religious con- 
fraternities, and indeed retained this character 
even after the Reformation in Catholic sections. 
In the meantime they were gradually developing 
economic features and championing the interests 
of their members. There was at this early period 

11 Bruno Schoenlank, " So dale Kdmpfe vor 300 Jahren," pp. 
51, 72, 143, 146. (Second Edition.) 



228 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

no evidence of what might be called a conflict be- 
tween capital and labor. The number of journey- 
men who might be employed by any single master 
was very restricted. Until the day of their ab- 
solute decline the craft gilds sought to prevent the 
concentration of wealth in the hands of a few. 
Hence the number of journeymen that could be 
engaged by even the most prosperous gildsman 
was usually restricted to two or three, together 
with a proportionate number of apprentices. Fre- 
quently, in the early statutes, the master was lim- 
ited to a single servant. No craftsman, at this 
period, was likely to have more than two journey- 
men and as many apprentices. Considering the 
methods of production then employed, such meas- 
ures did not interfere with the quantity of the out- 
put, while they greatly enhanced its quality and 
absolutely prevented every form of capitalism. 
Under these conditions apprentices and journey- 
men could still have every reasonable opportunity 
of attaining to mastership, and the journeymen 
gilds were rather religious and social than eco- 
nomic in their nature. Later, however, when the 
number of apprentices was increased and more 
capital was consequently required for competition, 
fewer could attain to economic independence, and 
even the work itself of the journeymen might be 
threatened. The worst conditions arose where 
the craft gilds themselves had lost their religious 
principles, or failed to put them into practice, and 



THE FIRST MODERN LABOR CLASS 229 

became capitalistic and exclusive. In proportion 
as this took place the journeymen gilds became 
militant organizations and the conflict between the 
oligarchic merchant gilds of the Continent and the 
early trade gilds was repeated, but with far less 
success for the organizations of the journeymen 
that now really represented the labor class. Al- 
though this situation reached its climax after the 
Reformation, it had already become serious 
enough in many instances before this time. In 
France it became necessary, as early as 1456, to 
insist that masters must personally supervise their 
shops. 12 

In the beginning, even where conflicts developed, 
a tolerable understanding existed between masters 
and journeymen. The old disputes, says Bren- 
tano, seemed merely like family disagreements, 
between parents and children. The situation 
could not be stated more exactly. Nowhere was 
there a trace of opposition to the existing system, 
or of a class struggle, in the Socialistic sense of 
the word. 13 In most instances a working agree- 
ment was gradually arrived at between the journey- 
men gilds and the masters' organizations. Mas- 
ters, journeymen and apprentices still worked side 
by side at the same tasks, sharing the same labors 
and exchanging their mutual confidences with one 

12 E. Levasseur, " Histotre des Classes Ouvrieres en France!' 
II, p. 92. 

13 Ashley, Pesch, Schoenlank,, etc. 



230 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

another. Hence the family spirit that abided 
among them. So long, indeed, as the principles 
of their Catholic faith strongly influenced both 
masters and men it was possible always to effect 
a reconciliation between the various interests. 
Thus at Strassburg in 1363 we find a board of 
arbitration appointed to decide all disputes be- 
tween masters and journeymen, made up of five 
members from each of these two classes. 14 An- 
other arrangement, made by the Tailors' Gild at 
Aschaffenburg, 1527, was the settlement of all 
difficulties by a commission appointed jointly by 
the journeymen's gild, the master tailors and the 
archbishop. 15 

That attempts to suppress the journeymen or- 
ganizations must have been frequent in the begin- 
ning, when their economic demands were first set 
forth in opposition to their masters, we might 
well surmise. Thus in London a proclamation 
was issued by the city authorities in 1383, forbid- 
ding all " congregations, covins and conspiracies M 
on the part of the workmen for fear that they 
would seek to raise their wages. Four years later 
three journeymen cordwainers, in the same city, 
combined with a Friar Preacher to found a fra- 
ternity. The latter was to bring their case to 
the notice of the Pope, but the men were seized 

14 Schanz, op. cit., p. 28. 

15 The Journeyman Barber. Mss. of gild statutes at Bene- 
dictine Monastery, St. Meinrad, Ind. 



THE FIRST MODERN LABOR CLASS 23 1 

and confined in Newgate prison before the plan 
had matured. 16 It shows how here, as at all other 
times, the Church supported the workingman in 
his just rights. 

In Germany, too, the Church was with the 
journeymen. The monks of Niirnberg excited 
the ire of the masters by permitting the secret 
meetings of the former to be held in their mon- 
astery, while the Bishop of Eichstaat championed 
the cause of the journeymen belonging to the va- 
rious cutlery trades. In mentioning such in- 
stances, Schoenlank with an unconscious bias con- 
cluded that such a course must have been to the 
Church's interest. But alignment with the rich 
and powerful masters might have far more ad- 
vanced her cause in a temporal manner. She was 
following in the footsteps of her Master. So, 
too, she had been with the crafts in their early 
trials. It was with the help of the Church only 
that journeymen gilds were ever formed at all. 

After a period of conflicts or strikes, such as 
now often took place, a working agreement was 
usually found, or the journeymen gilds, as in Eng- 
land, were gradually brought under the super- 
vision of the craft gilds and various arrangements 
were made to deal with their grievances. Often 
they simply ceased to exist and in not a few in- 
stances the journeymen were in some way admitted 
into the masters' gilds, whose wardens or other 

16 Riley, " Memorials," 480, 495. 



232 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

officers would adjudge their case when brought 
to the notice of the gild. In England a class of 
journeymen, as Ashley says, became a permanent 
part of the gild system and remained so for cen- 
turies. 17 In the Council of Keyserberg, on the 
other hand, we find them established with their 
own courts and laws. It was in Germany that 
the journeymen gilds flourished most and gave 
rise to an entire series of imperial and terri- 
torial decrees. 18 

As a typical instance of the claims set forth by 
these journeymen we may take the following list 
summarized here from the demands made by the 
journeymen tailors of Strassburg towards the end 
of the fifteenth century. They were drawn up in 
connection with a new set of regulations which the 
master tailors were seeking to obtain from the city 
council. The journeymen demanded: (1) the 
maintenance of the customary fourteen days' trial 
before entering upon a contract. (2) The main- 
tenance of the fourteen days' wandering, a period 
of time within which the journeymen as well as 
the masters were at liberty to dissolve their con- 
tract. (3) The continuance of the old custom 
which permitted the journeyman to provide a sub- 
stitute to take his place if he desired to leave his 
occupation, instead of being subject to fine and 
black-list. (4) The abrogation of the vague rul- 

17 W. J. Ashley, op. cit., II, pp. 101-103. 
I* Ibid. Note 163. 



THE FIRST MODERN LABOR CLASS 233 

ing that journeymen and apprentices must pledge 
themselves to prevent the master's losses and fur- 
ther his gain, since this might give an opportunity 
for the latter to dismiss his journeymen without 
P a Y- (5) The clarifying of a certain clause re- 
garding the wage-contract. (6) The righting of 
the disproportion between the wage and the high 
fine inflicted on the journeymen for absenting 
themselves from work through idleness. (7) 
They admit that they are to do no independent 
work, but are to receive all work through their 
masters, and they further agree with the latter 
that no journeyman should do piece-work. (8) 
They finally demand greater precision in regard 
to another wage clause which arouses their shrewd 
suspicion. 19 

The journeymen's headquarters were the inn, 
or Herberge, as it was called in Germany, where 
organization had progressed exceptionally in this 
regard. Both masters and journeymen cooper- 
ated in this institution. Here the journeymen 
met, consulted and held their feasts. The Her- 
bergsvater found accommodation in the inn for 
every wandering journeyman. It was the Y. M. 
C. A., and far more than that, of the later 
medieval times. Here were listed the names of 
the masters in need of men. They who applied 
first were served first, but precedence was given 
to the master with a smaller number of journey- 

19 Schanz, op. cit. t pp. 37-40. 



234 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

men, so that the old gild principles were still kept 
in view. Beds, too, and hospital care were pro- 
vided here for the sick, while traveling journey- 
men who could not find employment were often 
paid a sum sufficient to bring them to the next 
town. The fund for this was jointly contributed 
by the masters and the journeymen. Similar in- 
stitutions were conducted by the French compag- 
nons. 20 

Shelten, or reviling, was the weapon used by the 
journeymen gilds. It was a system of black-list- 
ing, by which a gild member was not allowed to 
work for a master or with a journeyman who had 
been " reviled," until they had atoned for their 
offense and been restored to favor. So, too, in 
case of strikes, warning was sent to the journey- 
men of neighboring towns not to seek employment 
in the strike center until economic peace had been 
restored. These strikes were never directed 
against the existing system, nor even against the 
hours of work, though the question of holidays 
was raised and wages at times became a very vital 
issue. Often however it was merely a matter of 
gild honor. Such was the famous ten-years' 
strike of the Colmar baker journeymen, which be- 
gan with a question of precedence at a Corpus- 
Christi procession, and ended finally in a complete 
victory for the journeymen, without a single issue 
of economics being raised throughout all this 

20 Brcntano, etc. 



THE FIRST MODERN LABOR CLASS 235 

period. It had lasted from 1495 to 1505. 
Hence the reason for admitting under such cir- 
cumstances Brentano's happy description of these 
disagreements in early Catholic times as " family 
disputes between parents and children." 

This condition can best be understood by noting 
the fact that although abuses existed, yet gild reg- 
ulations were no less severe in regard to masters 
than to servants. If the latter were to conduct 
themselves " properly " and respectfully, the for- 
mer too were strictly punished by their own gild 
authorities if they held back the wages of their 
men. These wages were determined, in England, 
by the gild or its wardens in a manner which, Ash- 
ley remarks, " was fair in itself in so far as the 
master's own remuneration was fixed by legisla- 
tive or civic ordinance." 

The journeymen gilds, in fine, were, until the 
Reformation, religious societies, and indeed re- 
mained such in Catholic countries. They were 
established " in honor of Almighty God, His 
Blessed Mother Mary and all the Saints " or with 
some similar sacred dedication. They created 
funds for the lighting of candles before the altars 
on Feast Days and other occasions. They pro- 
vided Masses for their dead comrades and sol- 
emnly attended the funeral services. They do- 
nated precious vestments, chalices and missals, and 
even built their own chapel, as did the bakers' 
journeymen at Strassburg with the aid of liberal 



236 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

donations given them. Special vaults were set 
aside for their dead in church or monastery, as 
in Freiburg and Frankfurt. Nor, as we have 
seen, was Christian charity neglected. They pro- 
vided beds for the sick in their own inns or founded 
funds for this purpose in some established hospi- 
tal. Thus in 1524 the Schaffhausen gild of jour- 
neymen smiths gave its entire capital to the Seel- 
haus that every sick journeyman might there be 
cared for until he was restored to health. A per- 
manent official was appointed to supervise this task. 
At times the masters' gild itself provided for such 
needs. " If any serving man of the said trade, " 
reads an ordinance of the Braelers' Gild, " who 
has behaved himself well and loyally towards his 
masters whom he served, shall fall sick or be un- 
able to help or maintain himself, he shall be found 
by the good folks of the said trade until he shall 
have recovered and be able to maintain him- 
self." 21 At times contributions were made by 
masters and journeymen to a common foundation 
that was equivalent to a social insurance fund for 
sick and disabled journeymen. Thus everywhere 
the Catholic creed of faith and works was applied 
in action so far as the influence of the Church 
extended. 

21 Riley, " Memorials," 277. 



CHAPTER XXIII 

REVALUATION OF THE MIDDLE AGES 

AMONG the most hopeful signs of our 
time is the changed attitude regarding 
the Middle Ages. This was brought 
about by three causes. First came the fail- 
ure of the capitalistic system. Concentrating 
the ownership of the means of production 
in the hands of the few it deprived the mil- 
lions of any voice, or share in the regulation of 
what most vitally concerned them. Against the 
arbitrary use of this tremendous power the minds 
of men naturally revolted and they reverted to 
the days preceding the great Industrial Revolution 
and the Reformation. Here, in the Catholic 
Middle Ages, they found realized, for the first 
and last time in history, the ideals of industrial 
democracy which to them were of far greater im- 
portance than any outward forms of government 
or mere national prosperity that left their own 
lives unaffected. " To-day," E. T. Raymond 
wrote in Everyman, " the most earnest minds are 
looking to a revival of the gild system as the only 
alternative to a new servile State." 

237 



238 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

But the thunder of the cannons, too, in the 
great World War helped to recall the fact, which 
had so long been studiously overlooked, that the 
highest achievements of human skill and intellect 
had after all been accomplished in the ages once 
accounted " dark"; the ages which produced the 
world's most wonderful art and architecture, its 
greatest poetry and richest thought; the ages of 
which Shakespeare was but the lavish heir, spend- 
ing prodigally the legacy whose full greatness had 
been attained in Dante and the Angelic Doctor, 
in Raphael and Michelangelo, in the beauty of 
Rheims Cathedral and the stateliness of Notre 
Dame. To quote Ralph Adams Cram: 

It has needed this war to drive men back and beyond the form 
to the matter itself, and to give them some realization of the sin- 
gular force and potency and righteousness of an epoch which 
begins now to show itself as the best man has ever created, and 
one as well that contains within itself the solution of our 
manifold and tragical difficulties, and in fact the model where- 
upon we must rebuild the fabric of a destroyed culture and 
civilization. 1 

11 The great productive scholars of the present 
day," wrote Lane Cooper in the Nation for June 
7, 1919, " are medievalists." 

Comparable entirely with the supreme triumphs 
of art and architecture, was the social wisdom 
displayed in the medieval gilds at their highest 
stages of perfection. The brush of a Titian or 

1 " The Substance of Gothic," Preface, pp. viii, ix. 



REVALUATION OF THE MIDDLE AGES 239 

the pen of the great Florentine himself never gave 
expression to a deeper knowledge of human na- 
ture than we find reflected in these masterpieces 
of social thought and experience, transfused with 
profound religious conviction and touched with 
an artistry of the spirit that singer and painter 
have never surpassed. 

Lastly there has taken place a revival of his- 
toric knowledge. To the long-continued school- 
boy repetition and the learned-by-rote recitation 
of half truths and entire falsehoods regarding the 
Middle Ages, on the part even of otherwise most 
reputable authorities, there succeeded a more di- 
rect and sympathetic study. Men gradually began 
to drop the misnomer " dark " applied to those 
ages of brilliant thought and magnificent achieve- 
ment. It was an epithet best suited to qualify the 
mind of the writer who still so sadly misused it. 
Who knows but at some future period of history 
men may suggest for our own materialistic cen- 
turies the title once so unjustly applied to those 
ages of vigorous youth and lofty aspiration. To 
those times the world now wisely reverts for lesson 
and inspiration. In the third of his articles on 
" Prospects in English Literature," published in 
the London Athenaum, " Muezzin " thus pic- 
tured the modern situation as it was to be more 
fully revealed in the aftermath of the Great War: 

To-day it is the Middle Ages that claim our interest and 
understanding, for there are signs everywhere that the era in- 



24O DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

augurated by humanism and Protestantism, and carried forward 
on the two great tidal waves of industrialism and the French 
Revolution, is already passing away. We have gained much 
in the way of intellectual freedom, political privileges, and the 
creature comforts from these changes; but it is beginning to be 
realized that we have sold a large measure of our birthright 
for this appetizing mess of pottage. Above all the temple of 
the human spirit lies in ruins, its altars are overthrown, and 
the wild asses pasture undisturbed within its walls. And 
though, as we must, we bring all the appliances of a scientific 
civilization and the fruits of accumulated knowledge to assist 
us in the task of reconstruction, we can learn much from the 
men of the Middle Ages, for they were supreme architects in 
this manner of building, and the temple they set up lasted a 
thousand years. 2 

With a new sense of freedom, after the passing 
of the abhorrent Reformation doctrine of the Di- 
vine right of kings, against which the voice of the 
Church had thundered through the centuries, men 
can now better realize her services to humanity as 
the champion in all times of the poor and disin- 
herited. Referring to Cardinal Mercier the New 
York Times believed that it could pay him no 
higher compliment than simply to pronounce him 
worthy of the great tradition of his Church, which 
was the only Church of the Middle Ages. " This 
valiant priest," it wrote, " recalls the best things 
in the Middle Ages, when the Church never feared 
to speak out, at any cost or danger, in behalf of 
the oppressed." (April 20, 1919.) 

We recall the glowing passage in President 
Wilson's " The New Freedom," describing the 

2 May, 1917, D. 234. 



REVALUATION OF THE MIDDLE AGES 24 1 

Catholic Church as the perennial fountain-source 
of the spirit of freedom and democracy through- 
out the Middle Ages. It was this same spirit 
which she infused into the gilds, wherever they 
remained responsive to her teachings and direc- 
tion. Men even of such extreme views as Hynd- 
man, in his " Historic Basis of Socialism in Eng- 
land," and the Russian anarchist writer, Kropot- 
kin, in his " Mutual Aid a Factor of Evolution, " 
grow eloquent when discoursing upon the Middle 
Ages. Without understanding the inwardness of 
the true Catholic devotion to Mary, which never 
confuses her with Divinity nor hopes for pardon 
where sin is unatoned and unrepented, Mr. Henry 
Adams passes into an ecstasy of admiration in his 
44 Mont-Saint-Michel and Chartres." Almost at 
random Ralph Adams Cram 3 covers page after 
page with references to modern works filled with 
the deepest appreciation of medievalism. The au- 
thors, it is true, are not seldom at fault in their in- 
terpretations owing to the want of that Catholic 
Faith which holds the key to its own past, and is 
in all its essence the same to-day, as in the days of 
Dante or the days of the inspired writers of the 
books of the New r Testament, while always ad- 
mirably adapted to every change of social life the 
centuries may bring. 

Medievalism is the study of a lifetime, for it is that great 
3 " The Substance of Gothic," xiii-xviii. 



242 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

cycle of five centuries wherein Christianity created for itself a 
world as nearly as possible made in its own image, a world 
that in spite of the wars and desecrations, the ignorance and 
the barbarism and the " restorations " of modernism has left us 
monuments and records and traditions of a power and beauty 
and nobility without parallel in history. 4 

It is with the democracy of the Catholic gilds of 
these ages that we are particularly concerned, and 
it is interesting to notice how this is recognized 
to have extended even into the field of education. 
Besides charity schools, like our modern parochial 
schools, and largely supported by the gilds, there 
were also gild schools proper. Our word u uni- 
versity " itself, as the Columbia University pro- 
fessor, James Harvey Robinson, explains, is 
merely a medieval synonym for gild: 

Before the end of the twelfth century the teachers had be- 
come so numerous in Paris that they formed a union, or gild, 
for the advancement of their interests. This union of profes- 
sors was called by the usual name for corporations in the 
Middle Ages, universitas ; hence our word, university. The 
King and the Pope both favored the university and granted the 
teachers and students many of the privileges of the clergy. 5 

So during the following centuries numerous uni- 
versities sprang up in France, Italy and Spain. 
Oxford and Cambridge were founded and great 
centers of learning flourished everywhere. Uni- 
versity life attained a prominence it has never 
equaled since. Oxford alone is said to have num- 

4 ibid. 

6 " Medieval and Modern Times," p. 251. 



REVALUATION OF THE MIDDLE AGES 243 

bered about 10,000 students. Other universities 
are claimed to have numbered even 20,000 and 
30,000 students. " Monasteries," says Professor 
Laurie, " regularly sent boys of thirteen and four- 
teen to university seats. A Papal instruction of 
1335 required every Benedictine and Augustinian 
community to send boys to the university in the 
proportion of one in twenty of their residents. " 6 
Traveling scholars, as the writer adds, were ac- 
commodated gratuitously, in the houses of priests 
or monastery hospitals, and even local subscrip- 
tions were offered to help them on their way. 
Here was a true democracy of learning. Higher 
education was not confined to the clergy except 
only when the energy of the Church was neces- 
sarily absorbed in the teaching of the very rudi- 
ments of civilization and of the first principles of 
religious life to the races emerging from savagery. 
In the establishment of these early seats of 
learning the influence of the gilds was predom- 
inant. Regarding the origin of the three great 
universities at Paris, Oxford and Bologna, Father 
Cuthbert is thus quoted in the London Tablet: 

They started without charters or even buildings of their own, 
and were at first simply a group who formed themselves into 
a closed gild, and borrowed private houses, churches or public 
halls. Both scholars and masters were subject to gild authority. 
At Bologna it was a Scholars' Gild which ruled and appointed 
the authority to which the masters were responsible; but even- 
tually the masters allied themselves with the town authorities, 

6 " The Rise and Early Constitution of the University." 



244 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

and so the university became subject to the civic power. At 
Paris and Oxford the Masters' Gild elected the Council and 
officials who governed the universities. Later on the two gilds 
combined, that is the gild included both scholars and masters. 7 

Thus these early Catholic universities were in 
the strictest sense popular and democratic institu- 
tions. Later it became the fashion to ask for a 
Papal or a royal charter. " That given to Oxford 
in 1 2 14 by the Legate Otho is probably the earli- 
est." These facts are now fully acknowledged 
by non-Catholic authorities and even the London 
Times was able to launch forth upon a eulogy of 
the Papacy in the work of elementary and higher 
education during the entire period of the Middle 
Ages: 

The organization and control of the universities of Europe 
was an achievement that is a deathless laurel in the Papal 
crown. In educational matters there was universal confidence 
in the judgment and justice of the Papacy from the days of 
Eugenius II in the ninth century to the days of the Counter- 
Reformation in the sixteenth. 

But it was not only in university matters that the educational 
activity of the Papacy was so remarkable. Whether we regard 
Canon 34 of the canons promulgated at the Concilium Romanum 
in 826, or the decrees of the Third Lateran Council in 1179, of 
the Fourth Lateran Council in 1215, and of other Councils, such 
as that of Vienna in 1311, we always find that the medieval 
Church is seeking to advance learning of all grades, and to 
coordinate educational effort of all kinds. And the efforts of 
the Central Conference were amply supplemented by what were, 
in effect, diocesan conferences. 8 

7 May 3, 1919. 

8 Educational Supplement, Jan. 2, 1919. 



REVALUATION OF THE MIDDLE AGES 245 

The decree of the Third Lateran Council, in 
1 179, to which the London Times refers is itself 
a complete refutation of the calumnies that, 
through ignorance, had long been spread against 
the Church in the Middle Ages. It reads: 

Since the Church of God, like a good mother, is bound to 
provide so that the poor who can get no help from the wealth 
of parents should not be deprived of the opportunity of learn- 
ing and making progress in letters, let a complete benefice be 
assigned in every cathedral church to a schoolmaster, who will 
teach clerics and poor scholars for nothing. 

The Fourth Lateran Council extended this de- 
cree to all countries. By this a perfect system 
of free public schools was ordained. The democ- 
racy of learning as of industry was the natural 
result of the genuinely democratic spirit of the 
Catholic Church which has never changed since, 
the Galilean fisherman was made the Rock on 
which Christ constructed it: " Thou art Peter, 
and on this rock I will build my church." The 
seal of the Popes is the seal of the Fisherman. 

Our revaluation of the Middle Ages is thus 
steadily progressing and entering into the final 
stage of popularization through the daily press. 
Particularly in the field of sociology will these 
ages be of constantly increasing interest and pro- 
foundly practical instruction for our times. That 
the common workingman was then better provided 
for than in the days when capitalism reached its 
climax before the outbreak of the World War, is 



246 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

now universally acknowledged by all who may be 
trusted to speak with authority upon this question. 
The advantages of labor were all secured to it 
through the potent influence of the gilds, but in 
particular of the craft gilds as based on the re- 
ligious principles of the Catholic Church with 
which they were integrally connected. Separated 
from her, they were left as a body reft of the 
soul, lifeless, inefficient, passing slowly into inevita- 
ble decay. With their religious spirit intact they 
might have confidently faced the period of eco- 
nomic reconstruction. This too we find admitted 
without hesitation. 

It was due to the struggle of the craft gilds 
alone, as was shown in a previous chapter, that the 
world was not sunk into a state of uncontrolled 
capitalism half a millennium before the coming of 
the Industrial Revolution. Through the struggle 
of the gildsmen the nascent cities, beginning with 
the eleventh century, won their enfranchisement 
from the feudal lords who then had too often out- 
lasted their usefulness. In the same way they 
overcame the formidable power of the merchant 
corporations that threatened to establish their oli- 
garchy of wealth. So too, through the efforts of 
the gilds the first modern Christian democracies 
were formed. Many of the medieval cities grew 
into independent States. In Italy particularly, 
sprang up those marvelous Catholic republics, like 
Genoa, Lucca, Pisa, and Florence. 



REVALUATION OF THE MIDDLE AGES 247 

Thus, in the latter city, the consules of the mer- 
chant gilds first appear in 1 182 and from this time 
on no important transaction takes place without 
their cooperation. In Pisa, besides three mer- 
chant gilds, there existed after about 1260 a union 
of seven artes or trade gilds consisting respectively 
of such different elements as notaries, smiths, and 
wine dealers. They were governed by two capi- 
tanei chosen in turn from different gilds and seven 
other officers, one from each gild. The widest 
autonomy -was enjoyed by each organization. 9 

Oligarchy and class-rule, it is true, began again 
in proportion as the gilds themselves deteriorated 
in their spirit of religion and democracy, or their 
influence declined, but their results lived on in the 
magnificent efflorescence of art stimulated through 
the powerful incentives offered by the Church. 
These are some of the facts that now again are re- 
ceiving their due valuation. 

9 Alfred Doran, " Entwickelung und Organisation der Floren- 
finer Ziinfte im 13. und 14. Jahrhundert." 



CHAPTER XXIV 

CIVIC PAGEANTS AND PLAYS 

WE have within recent years witnessed 
many revivals of medievalism in art and 
literature. In England Ruskin stood 
as the leader of this great movement. He had 
caught as none other the external beauty and 
splendor of the Middle Ages. As he came to 
know them better he likewise approached more 
closely to a love and veneration of the religion 
that has been the inspiration of everything noblest 
in life and highest in art. At a greater distance 
from the shrine stood the modern Pre-Raphaelite 
school of artists. They might indeed copy the 
outward form of the art of a Fra Angelico, but 
could not feel the rapture that inspired it. They 
lacked the faith and the love. Trammeled by 
conventions and remote from human sympathies, 
they could not stir the hearts of men. In our own 
day we are again approaching medievalism, but in 
another way. We have caught, however faintly 
and vaguely, what Ruskin had already sought to 
teach the world, the spirit of cooperation. It ex- 
presses itself in countless, often sadly misleading, 
ways, in our economic life. But again men fail 
to understand that there can be no assurance of a 

248 



CIVIC PAGEANTS AND PLAYS 249 

true and lasting universal brotherhood without a 
universal faith. 

Among the latest revivals of medievalism are 
the civic pageant and drama. The reproduction 
of " Everyman," in spite of its modern surround- 
ings and professional actors, faintly suggested the 
force and influence of the Catholic morality plays. 
Intended not for a select few, but for the religious 
instruction of all the people, such plays were truly 
popular in their nature. More ambitious were the 
first modern attempts once more to suggest by 
mammoth performances the medieval idea of co- 
operation in art. Perhaps most successful in this 
direction was the magnificent Civic Pageant and 
Masque of St. Louis. Manifestly, however, it 
is impossible to reproduce artificially in our own 
times the true spirit of cooperation as it was un- 
derstood in the days when the great minsters 
were erected, the work of generations of humble 
artisans. In spite of private interests there was 
always one center of Truth in which all were 
united. Every popular ceremony was full of 
beauty and symbolism, because religion had given 
a higher meaning to life. As a characteristic ex- 
ample of a purely civic nature we may here refer 
to the welcome given to King Henry at Dover in 
1432. The scene is pictured for us by Stow 
and the poet Lydgate. It is at once simple and 
artistic, popular and religious. 1 

1 Herbert, " Livery Companies of London," I, 93 ff. 



250 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

Robed in gowns of scarlet and with hoods of 
red the aldermen are described riding out to meet 
their monarch, who had been crowned King of 
France. At their head was the mayor, in crim- 
son velvet, with a furred hat of velvet, a girdle 
of gold about his waist and a " jewel " of gold 
hung about his neck. In attendance upon him, 
mounted on great coursers, rode the huntsmen, 
clad in suits of red bespangled with silver. Then 
followed in procession the entire commonalty of 
the city, all in white gowns and scarlet hoods, with 
" sundry devyses embrowdyd richly." Their gar- 
ments of white symbolized the purity of their loy- 
alty, while the embroideries evidently suggested 
the gilds to which they belonged. To lend still 
greater variety, the Merchant Strangers, the Gen- 
oese and Florentines, and the " Easterlings," as 
the German Hanse Merchants were called, all 
took part, " clad in there manere." The poet 
Lydgate thus pictures the scene in the quaint Eng- 
lish of his day: 

The clothing was of colour full covcnable: 

The noble mair clad in red velvet, 

The shrieves, the aldermen, full notable, 

In furryd clokes, the colour of Scarlett; 

In stately wyse whanne they were met, 

Ich one were wel horsyd, and made no delay, 

But with there mair rood forth on there way. 

The citezens ich on of the citee, 

In their entent that they were pure and clene: 



CIVIC PAGEANTS AND PLAYS 25 I 

Ches them of whit a ful faire lyvere, 2 

In every craft, as it was wel scne, 

To shewe the trowthe that they dede mene 3 

Toward the kyng, hadde mad them feithfully 

In sundry devyses embrowdyd richely. 

What a lavishness and wealth of color, what a 
freshness and delight of life, as compared with 
our own modern drabness! Something of the 
beauty of the faith of these old gildsmen was re- 
flected even in their daily intercourse. The mayor 
on this occasion was a grocer by profession. 
What more appropriate, therefore, than that the 
scenic display which crowned the festivity should 
represent a grove of foreign fruits: 

Oranges, almondys and the pomegranade, 
Lymons, dates, there colours fresh and glade, 
Pypyns, quynces, chandrellys to disport, 
And the pom cedre, corageous to recomfort; 
Eke othere fruites, whiche that more comown be, 
Quenyngges, peches, costardes, and wardens, 
And others manye ful faire and freshe to se. 

In the midst of this new Garden of Eden were 
three wells, in allusion to the mayor's name, who 
chanced to be called Wells. But the true Scrip- 
tural joyousness of these days of Catholic merri- 
ment displayed itself when at the King's approach 
the waters, by some clever mechanical device, sud- 
denly disappeared and all the three wells were 
filled with purest wine, recalling our Lord's 

2 /. e., " Chose them of white, etc." 
s "Did mean." 



252 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

miracle at the wedding feast of Cana. And there, 
prepared to serve the guests, stood the three al- 
legorical personages: Mercy, Grace and Pity. 
There, too, were the ancient patriarchs, Enoch and 
Elias, " full circumspect and wys," with " lokkes 
hore," to offer prayers for the King and call down 
God's blessings on his reign: " In enemyes 
handes that he nevere falle." 

In his " Livery Companies of England/' pub- 
lished in 1837, William Herbert says: 

What confers an additional interest on the shows of this 
period is, that almost all the ceremonies of the companies, and 
indeed every public act, was then more or less mixed up with 
the Catholic religion; a religion which, bringing with it a 
peculiar splendor of worship, shed over them a luster which 
we find but faintly reflected on its disuse. 4 

How religion in its most serious form could be 
happily combined with popular amusement is best 
seen in the grand pageants and plays of these 
times. Our modern theater with its garish lights, 
its tremulous music and feverish passion, can give 
no conception of the popular performances of the 
simple craftsmen, which dealt with the intense 
realities of life and death, and with the august 
sanctities of religion. Even the banterings and 
buffooneries, before the days of the decline, were 
conceived in the spirit of childish innocence and 
glee, telling of simple trust in the mercy and love 
of an Almighty Father. Only when the spirit of 

* Vol. I, p. 66. 



CIVIC PAGEANTS AND PLAYS 253 

religion itself had been weakened among the peo- 
ple did these performances degenerate until they 
finally passed away. Most famous among the few 
survivals was the decennial play of Oberammer- 
gau, which has remained the wonder and despair 
of the world's greatest artists. 

To show how truly popular these performances 
were, it will suffice to point to the gild statutes of 
a single English town, Newcastle-on-Tyne. Ap- 
parently every trade union within its walls per- 
formed its public play on Corpus Christi Day. 
Thus the gild of Barber-Chirurgeons, after going 
in procession arrayed in their liveries, were after- 
wards to play at their own expense " The Bap- 
tizing of Christ." Similarly the Craft of Weav- 
ers in the same city ordained that its members 
must corporately participate in the procession and 
must play their play and pageant of " The Bear- 
ing of the Cross." The Slaters, according to an 
ordinance of 145 1 were to give their own play, 
specified at a later date, when they had united 
into one gild with the Bricklayers, as " The Offer- 
ing of Isaac by Abraham." The Millers of the 
same town were enjoined to enact " The Deliver- 
ance of the Children of Israel out of the Thral- 
dom, Bondage and Servitude of King Pharao." 
The House Carpenters, then known as Wrights, 
played " The Burial of Christ," and the Masons, 
" The Burial of our Lady Saint Mary the Vir- 
gin." Many of these ordinances, it may be men- 



254 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

tioned, refer to the sixteenth century, showing how 
the religious spirit had still survived in the hearts 
of the people. 

All the crafts annually combined for the solemn 
Corpus Christi procession. This custom was ev- 
erywhere observed in all cities of Christendom, 
and the pageants and processions of Corpus 
Christi were the great civic as well as religious 
event of the year. Nothing in modern times can 
equal the true social spirit which animated these 
splendid demonstrations of Christian faith and 
universal brotherhood. Here indeed all were 
united in a common membership with Christ, their 
Head. He Himself was present in their midst, 
as of old among His Apostles when the sacred 
words, daily spoken in the Holy Mass, were for 
the first time uttered and that mystery enacted 
which He commanded should be repeated to the 
end of time by the successors of His chosen 
Twelve : " Taking bread, he gave thanks, and 
brake; and gave to them, saying: This is my 
body, which is given for you. Do this for a com- 
memoration of me." 5 The meaning of those 
words was clear. The mystery they contained 
was as infinitely condescending as it was sublime. 
No wonder, therefore, that the day set aside for 
its honor should have become the occasion of civic 
demonstrations such as will never again be wit- 
nessed until men are once more united in the one 

■ Luke xxii.19. (Douay.) 



CIVIC PAGEANTS AND PLAYS 255 

true Faith which alone can satisfy their longings. 
To make plain the civic nature of these events 
we need only instance the Corpus Christi proces- 
sion held at York. In that single city in the year 
141 5, ninety-six gilds marched with their insignia 
and fifty-four pageants were presented in the pro- 
cession. As early as 1325 we find, in fact, a spe- 
cial Corpus Christi Gild which had developed out 
of a former merchant gild whose economic use- 
fulness had evidently ceased with the coming of 
the craft gilds. Not the laity only, but the priors 
of two religious houses and all the parish priests 
were enrolled in its membership. The main ob- 
ject of the gild was to make provision for the 
Corpus Christi procession in which the priests 
marched with the craft gilds. The latter carried 
candles, unfolded their banners and displayed their 
marvelous pageants, after which they regaled 
themselves in good Scriptural fashion. 6 What 
could be more closely related than popular hap- 
piness and true religion, whether we behold 
David dancing before the Ark or Christ among 
the wedding guests. As Lowell beautifully says: 

This is what the Roman Cnurch docs for religion, feeding 
the soul not with the essential religious sentiment, not with a 
drop or two of the tincture of worship, but making us feel one 
by one all those original elements of which worship is com- 
posed ; not bringing the end to us but making us pass over and 
feel beneath our feet all the golden rounds of the ladder by 

• Gross, "The Gild Merchant," I, p. 162. 



256 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

which the climbing generations have reached that end; not 
handing us drily a dead and extinguished Q. E. D., but letting 
it declare itself by the glory with which it interfuses the incense- 
clouds of wonder and aspiration and beauty in which it is 
veiled. The secret of her power is typified in the mystery of 
the Real Presence. 7 

But such pageants and processions were not lim- 
ited to Corpus Christi Day. They frequently 
took place on the great feast days of the different 
gilds. The members in their liveries, garlanded 
with flowers or crowned with wreaths of leaves, 
bearing in their hands lighted candles which often 
were most richly ornamented, might be seen 
marching through the streets of the city with song 
and music on the way to their own gild church or 
altar. Here they attended at Mass, which was 
solemnly celebrated, and a merry banquet followed 
at which all partook. On the next day they might 
again assemble at a Requiem sung for the souls of 
the departed members. As an interesting ex- 
ample it will suffice to quote the regulations for 
the annual pageant held on the feast of the Puri- 
fication by the religious gild of St. Mary, estab- 
lished at Beverley in 1355. They are charming 
in their faith and simplicity. 

All the brethren and sisters, the ordinance reads, shall meet 
together in a fit and appointed place, away from the church; 
and there one of the gild shall be clad in comely fashion as a 
queen, like to the glorious Virgin Mary, having what may seem 
a son in her arms. Two others shall be clad like to Joseph 

7 Other similar flashes occur in Old New England writers. 



CIVIC PAGEANTS AND PLAYS 257 

and Simeon; and two shall go as angels, carrying a candle- 
bearer, on which shall be twenty-four thick wax lights. With 
these and other great lights borne before them, and with music 
and gladness, the pageant Virgin with her Son, and Joseph and 
Simeon shall go in procession to the church. And all the sisters 
of the gild shall follow the Virgin; and afterwards all the 
brethren. Each of them shall carry a wax light weighing half 
a pound. And they shall go two and two, slowly pacing to the 
church; and when they have got there, the pageant Virgin shall 
offer her Son to Simeon at the high altar; and all the sisters 
and brethren shall offer their wax lights, together with a penny 
each. All this having been solemnly done, they shall go home 
again in gladness. 8 

Mass having been heard, as was the custom, 
they were later in the day to meet again for a 
simple banquet, regaling themselves with modest 
but hearty cheer, " rejoicing in the Lord, in praise 
of the glorious Virgin Mary." Such was the 
faith, such the happiness, such the civic spirit, 
such the brotherhood in Christ in those days when 
there was still a " merrie " England, and when 
the Catholic Church in all her beauty was close 
to the hearts and lives of men. 

There was withal a spirit of profound democ- 
racy in this religion. It displayed itself in the 
very building of the churches where we behold that 
deep inward joy that comes from a conscience at 
peace and a heart inflamed with the love of God. 
In a letter written in 1145 Abbot Haimon thus 
describes how the building of Chartres Cathedral 
was begun: 

s Cornelius Walford, " Gilds," pp. 244, 245. J. T. Smith. 



258 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

Who has ever seen! Who has ever heard at all, in times 
past, that powerful princes of the world, that men brought up 
in honor and in wealth, that nobles, men and women, have bent 
their proud and haughty necks to the harness of carts, and that, 
like beasts of burden, they have dragged to the abode of Christ 
these wagons, loaded with wines, grains, oil, stone, wood, and 
all that is necessary for the wants of life, or for the construc- 
tion of the church? . . . There one sees the priests who preside 
over each chariot exhort every one to penitence, to confession 
of faults, to the resolution of a better life! There one sees old 
people, young people, little children, calling on the Lord with a 
suppliant voice, uttering to Him, from the depth of the heart, 
sobs and sighs with words of glory and praise! After the peo- 
ple, warned by the sound of trumpets and the sight of banners, 
have resumed their road, the march is made with such ease that 
no obstacle can retard it. . . . When they have reached the 
church they arrange the wagons about it like a spiritual camp, 
and during the whole night they celebrate the watch by hymns 
and canticles. On each wagon they light tapers and lamps; 
they place there the infirm and sick, and bring them the precious 
relics of the Saints for their relief. Afterwards the priests and 
clerics close the ceremony by processions which the people fol- 
low with devout heart, imploring the clemency of the Lord 
and of His Blessed Mother for the recovery of the sick. 9 

Merriment and deep devotion blended in the 
life of these brave men and leal, who best under- 
stood the true meaning of democracy and found 
its only safeguard in religion, whose worship was 
no less profound because they loved the brightness 
and the cheer of life, who mingled laughter with 
their deepest thoughts; who joyed to see the grin- 
ning gargoyle gurgling from cathedral eaves while 
saints and angels stood in glorious ranks about 

8 Henry Adams, " Mont-Saint-Michel and Chartres," pp. 104, 
105. 



CIVIC PAGEANTS AND PLAYS 259 

the carven portals that admitted to the House of 
God. They knew how, as men have never better 
known, to mingle prayer, worl^ and play into the 
glowing tapestry of life. 



CHAPTER XXV 

THE CHURCH AND THE PEOPLE 

WANT of accurate historic knowledge and 
a dearth of reliable literature on the 
historic backgrounds of the social ques- 
tion helped for a long time to perpetuate the be- 
lief that the Church, in the past, was opposed to 
the democratization of labor. Hence the conclu- 
sion that she must equally be opposed to it in our 
day. Reference is invariably made in this con- 
nection to the occasional clashes of interests be- 
tween bishops or monasteries on the one side, and 
the sturdy old gildsmen on the other. They are 
isolated instances chosen from the long centuries 
of medieval history and merely serve to call at- 
tention to the lasting harmony that existed be- 
tween the Church and the crafts, whose indebted- 
ness to her was beyond all reckoning. 

In dealing with this important question, it is 
necessary to distinguish between the period preced- 
ing the latter part of the fourteenth century, and 
the period which immediately followed and con- 
tinued on to the date of the Reformation. Going 
back to the ninth and eighth centuries, and even 
to earlier times, when all of Europe was Catholic, 

260 



THE CHURCH AND THE PEOPLE 26 1 

we look in vain for any wide-spread disaffection 
of the people against the Church. During this 
period, it is true, the bishops were often temporal 
sovereigns, while the abbots of famous monas- 
teries not seldom enjoyed an equal influence and 
power. Such was the accepted condition of the 
time. The rule of the bishops was characterized 
by its special benignity, while the wealth of the 
monasteries was in reality the dower of the poor. 
u Good hap to live neath the bishop's crook," be- 
came a proverbial expression. The influence of 
the monasteries cannot be called in question, nor 
the love and respect which all classes showed for 
the habit of the monk. The gifts which flowed 
into the coffers of the abbey found their way back 
again most freely to the people in their need. 
Religious houses at times lost the spirit of their 
primitive rule. Highly placed prelates, with in- 
creasing prosperity, might yield in particular in- 
stances to the lure of temporal interests and am- 
bitions, yet the confidence of the people was never 
withdrawn from the great body of their bishops 
and clergy and the truly popular religious orders 
of the day. Nor was this trust misplaced. Un- 
der all circumstances they ever found in them their 
only lasting friends. 

It was under the direct influence of the Church 
that the democratization of labor took place in 
the Middle Ages. It was under her guidance 
and tuition that the craft gilds unfolded their 



262 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

marvelous statutes. If the application of her 
teaching, embodying the highest possible concep- 
tion of human brotherhood, was not perfect on 
the part either of gildsmen or of clerics, the rea- 
son was to be found, not in the Church, but in 
that human nature which will always fall short 
of its loftiest ideals. It is clearly irrelevant to 
speak of any serious discord, at this period, be- 
tween the Church and the people who owed ev- 
erything to her. 

But can it be said that a change took place in the 
popular mind? The first great event to be noted 
occurred at the middle of the fourteenth century. 
We refer to the Black Death, which carried off 
one-fourth of the population of Europe. It 
reached England in 1348. " The clergy seem to 
have suffered the worst," writes Alfred Milnes, 
" probably falling a sacrifice to their own devo- 
tion in ministering to the dying; and the monas- 
teries worst of all." * Such was the example the 
Catholic clergy has ever given in every great 
popular calamity, showing how truly and pro- 
foundly the welfare of the people is at their heart. 
Priests and monks were found at their posts, giv- 
ing their lives for their flocks. 

The fewness of laborers, when the plague had 
passed, enabled those who survived, to demand ex- 
orbitant wages. The abundant crops of that year 
were left to stand unharvested in the fields and the 

1 "From Gild to Factory." 



THE CHURCH AND THE PEOPLE 263 

cattle roamed unherded over the pastures. In 
the cities also the same dearth of laborers existed. 
The laws repeatedly enacted at this period to for- 
bid the taking or giving of unusual wages are often 
severely censured. It was not possible strictly to 
enforce them, and wages almost doubled, but it is 
wrong to look upon them as capitalistic measures. 
44 These regulations of wages," says Brentano, 
44 were but the expression of the general policy of 
the Middle Ages, which considered that the first 
duty of the State was to protect the weak against 
the strong, which not only knew of rights but also 
of duties of the individual towards society, and 
condemned as usury every attempt to take un- 
seemly advantage of the temporal distress of one's 
neighbor." 2 Yet a great confusion resulted from 
which Europe seems never to have entirely recov- 
ered. A religious decline, too, set in and with it 
the inevitable economic disorder. Inferior and 
undesirable postulants, we are told, were often ac- 
cepted to fill out the ranks of the depleted clergy. 
The Church, however, had already accom- 
plished a great work. She had been the domi- 
nant influence in the abolition of slavery and had 
mightily contributed to the disappearance of the 
old forms of serfdom. She was now, gradually 
but surely, helping towards the greater emancipa- 
tion of the peasant classes. The process was nor- 
mal so long as the direct influence of the Church's 

2 " History and Development of Gilds," p. 78. 



264 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

teaching could be effective. Another instance of 
the lack of historic information is the statement 
often made that the liberation of the peasant 
classes began with Wyclif and the preaching of 
his " poor priests." The latter, it may be said in 
passing, were not priests at all, though some of 
them may have been poor enough after the fashion 
of the Bolshevist agitator of to-day. Misapplied 
Scripture texts served for their weapons of de- 
struction. More material means were to be used 
later. 

The theological theories of Wyclif do not con- 
cern us here. They centered in a denial of the 
spiritual authority of the Church and in an at- 
tack upon the Holy Eucharist. His direct princi- 
ple of social anarchism, however, was the doctrine 
that " dominion is founded in grace." No regard 
was to be had either for the property or authority 
of men in the state of sin. It was sufficient for 
Wyclif or his followers to decide that the men 
whose property they desired to alienate were not 
in the state of grace. Since, Wyclif himself, like 
other reformers, was a close personal friend of 
the wealthy secular lords, he cautiously limited the 
application of his principle to ecclesiastics only. 
This enabled him to curry favor with the rich in 
a twofold manner. Clerics and monks, he taught, 
committed sin by the very fact that they held prop- 
erty. It was therefore a pious duty of secular 
princes to relieve them of this encumbrance which 



THE CHURCH AND THE PEOPLE 265 

else must bring them to eternal damnation. The 
good lords would thus gain for themselves both 
earth and heaven at one happy stroke. In a simi- 
lar manner Luther later won the support of his 
favorite princes by giving them, not merely the 
property of the Church, but her spiritual authority 
as well. 

Wyclif s " poor priests," unlike their master, 
had no close intimacy with rich and powerful 
lords. Logically they extended their principle 
to secular owners as well. They were the Bol- 
shevists of their time and carried on their cam- 
paign with a similar enthusiasm. The existence 
of real social abuses won a temporary hearing for 
their wild and exaggerated statements. Their 
preaching contributed, with other causes, to bring 
about the Peasant Revolt of 138 1. 

Lollardy, as this movement was called, was of 
but short duration. It gathered for the moment 
a great following among the anti-clerical lords and 
adventurers, who were greedy to obtain posses- 
sion of ecclesiastical property and of the spoils 
of churches and monasteries. It gained adherents 
also among the disaffected subjects of rich abbeys 
and lords, and among all who wished to shake off 
the spiritual authority of the Church. " Wyclif s 
real influence," says the foremost writer upon this 
subject, Dr. James Gairdner, " did not long sur- 
vive his own day, and so far from Lollardy hav- 
ing taken any deep root among the English peo- 



2 66 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

pie, the traces of it had wholly disappeared long 
before the great revolution of which it was thought 
to be the forerunner. 3 In the meantime the 
Church continued her effective work for the crafts 
and the people, who did not fail to show their con- 
stant recognition and gratitude. " Here, as in 
Germany," says Cardinal Gasquet writing of Eng- 
land in the latter fifteenth and early sixteenth cen- 
tury, " the burgher folk, the merchants and the 
middle class generally, began to pour their gifts 
into a common fund from which to beautify their 
parish churches with a profusion which corre- 
sponded to, and is indicative of, the general 
growth in the material comforts of life, and would 
seem to show that religion had in nowise lost its 
hold over the hearts of the people." 4 Summing 
up his impressions of the social conditions of the 
period, James E. Thorold Rogers says: 

There were none of those extremes of poverty and wealth 
which have excited the astonishment of philanthropists, and are 
now exciting the indignation of workmen. The age, it is true, 
had its discontents, and these discontents were expressed for- 
cibly and in a startling manner. But of poverty which perishes 
unheeded, of a willingness to do honest work and a lack of 
opportunity, there was little or none. The essence of life in 
England during the days of the Plantagenets and Tudors was 
that every one knew his neighbor, and that every one was his 
brother's keeper. 5 

3 See Cardinal Gasquet, " England under the Old Religion 
and Other Essays." 

4 Ibid., pp. 21, 22. 

5 See Gasquet, " The Last Abbot of Glastonbury," pp. 251, 252. 



THE CHURCH AND THE PEOPLE 267 

This truth the Church had instilled deep into 
the minds of men. So she continued in her bene- 
ficient influence upon the people, until her teach- 
ings of charity and social justice were at last 
widely disregarded and her great popular institu- 
tions disrupted or rendered ineffective by the ca- 
tastrophe which now impended. 

It is impossible, says Cardinal Gasquet in 
another of his accurate and profound historic 
studies, to read the sermons of the period follow- 
ing upon the Black Death, " without seeing how 
entirely the clergy were with the people to secure 
full and entire liberty for themselves and their 
posterity." It is probably to the clergy, he 
concludes, that the preamble of an act passed in 
the first year of Richard II refers, which says: 
11 Villeins withdraw their services and customs 
from their lords, by the comfort and procurement 
of others, their counsellors, maintainers and abet- 
tors, etc., etc." 6 

Describing conditions in the " Golden Age," 
when England still retained the glorious heritage 
of its Catholic Faith, R. L. Outhwaite, in his study, 
11 The Land or Revolution," contrasts them with 
the evils that followed on the Reformation, though 
no controversial purpose was in his mind. He 
states the facts as he sees them, without penetrat- 
ing deeper to their ultimate causes, and it is sig- 

• Cardinal Francis Aidan Gasquet, " The Black Death," pp. 
232, 233. 



268 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

nificant that his only reference to the lands pos- 
sessed by the monks is the accurate statement that 
they were " held largely in trust for the people." 
The monks, we must remember, were themselves 
laborers, with a right to the soil they tilled. Of 
the days preceding the Reformation Outhwaite 
writes : 

Englishmen once had no dread of hunger, for they once were 
free. Four hundred years ago they had won their way out of 
serfdom and had established the Golden Age. Then no man 
starved, for three or four days' labor provided sufficient food 
for the week. So it was on the countryside, and so it was in 
the towns where, united in gilds, the workers were craftsmen 
and free. And this came about by no miraculous dispensation 
but through the simple fact that those who wished to till the 
soil had the opportunity to do so. Those were the days of 
Merrie England, when the village surrounded by its common 
fields sheltered a yeomanry the like of which the world had not 
seen before, and has not since. The common people, the Saxon 
serfs, had won their way to freedom by way of the land, for 
freedom consists in not being compelled to beg leave of an- 
other to toil and live. 

But the Reformation now followed, and with it 
came the era of " the land monopolist " and " the 
industrial slave market." He thus continues: 

Those from whose bondage the serfs had escaped, the feudal 
holders of one-third of English soil, determined to reestablish 
serfdom. The free land they saw was the basis of freedom, 
and this they proceeded to add to their estates. Rapidly the 
transformation of the Golden Age took place as the great es- 
tates grew. The peasants rose in rebellions, but were crushed 
by the nobles aided by foreign mercenaries of despotic kings. 
To these estates in the time of Henry VIII were added the 
monastery lands, held largely in trust for the people. The 



THE CHURCH AND THE PEOPLE 269 

gilds were broken up, and the unemployed man appeared. 
Slavery, with all its pains and penalties, the branding-iron and 
the gallows, was established, and in the course of fifty years 
the Golden Age had passed away. Soon after, in the reign of 
Elizabeth, the first Poor Law was placed on the Statute Book. 

From all this the Church had preserved the peo- 
ple. That this is no unfounded statement is plain 
from the fact that the same consequences followed 
in other lands. After quoting the English par- 
liamentarian, we shall allow ourselves the luxury 
of quoting to the same effect the volume of an 
Anglican chaplain in the Great War, who rightly 
says : 

It is perfectly true that the monastic life was a special voca- 
tion, but it is interesting that the ideals of the monastery were 
largely the ideals of labor outside it. Those ideals existed in 
the world of labor so long as the monastic system in its midst 
radiated them — that also is interesting. For the gild was ex- 
traordinarily like the community of religious. It also was based 
on religion, and sought both the sanction and the reward of re- 
ligion; it also maintained the honesty of physical toil, for the 
master had first to serve his apprenticeship, not as a junior 
partner but as a laborer; and it also set high the beauty of its 
craftmanship as ,a thing in itself a reward. With the passing 
of the gild, passed these ideals generally from the economic 
world. 7 

These facts will be more fully illustrated in the 
chapter on " The Great Catastrophe." 

7 Robert Keable, " Standing By," pp. 242, 243. 



CHAPTER XXVI 

CATHOLICS AND POLITICAL 
DEMOCRACY 

AMONG the fictions which long retained 
their hold upon the popular imagination 
was the strange assumption that democ- 
racy had been begotten by the Reformation. The 
movement that for a time actually succeeded in 
crushing almost every expression of popular rights 
was marvelously transformed into the very foun- 
tain-source of democratic liberties. It would in- 
deed be difficult, as men can now readily under- 
stand, to point to a more monumental travesty in 
all history. The patent absurdity was made pos- 
sible only by the lack of careful and impartial 
research. Even Luther, who conferred on his 
own princes the most autocratic powers in spiritual 
no less than in temporal matters, who fiercely sur- 
rendered the hapless peasants into the blood- 
stained hands of their merciless lords and for gen- 
erations to come fixed on them the yoke of a new 
and bitter serfdom, who in the famous sermon 
preached in 1524 longed for the return of the days 
of slavery, and to whom in his closing years the in- 
dignant people gave the fitting title: "Hypocrite 

270 



CATHOLICS AND POLITICAL DEMOCRACY 27 1 

and princes' menial," was still hailed by some, in 
our own twentieth century, as the great protagonist 
of modern democracy. Such praise must seem the 
consummation of all irony to those who are fa- 
miliar with his detestation of " the vulgar masses/' 
as he scornfully called them, telling the princelings 
of his day, that : 

They must be like men who drive mules. One must con- 
stantly cling to their necks (*. e., of the common people) and 
urge them on with whips, or else they will not move ahead. So 
then are the rulers to drive, beat, choke, hang, burn, behead 
and break upon the wheel the vulgar masses, Sir All. 1 

With such texts, that can be quoted profusely, 
written about his pedestal, Luther must form " a 
sorry sight," indeed, for those who would behold 
in him the glorification of democracy. " In virtue 
of the principle cujus regio, hnjus religio (the 
lord's religion is the subject's creed)," says Go- 
yan, " faith, in spite of Luther's doctrines, has not 
been a product and inspiration of conscience, but 
a livery only, imposed by some prince on his sub- 
jects." 2 It was Luther himself who is responsi- 
ble for this twofold autocracy. 

The good Church of England fares no better. 
In her " Constitutions and Canons," June 30, 
1640, it was made the sacred duty of every clergy- 
man at least four times a year to preach that " the 

^'Erlangen Edition of Luther's Works, XV, 2, p. 276. See 
* What Luther Taught," Chapter VI. 
2 " VAllemagne Religieuse" p. 2, apud Baudrillart. 



272 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

most sacred order of kings is of Divine right" a 
doctrine that would have been anathema if uttered 
in the Middle Ages. The preachers are further 
to instruct all good subjects that to set up " under 
any pretense whatsoever, any independent coactive 
power, either papal or popular, whether directly 
or indirectly ... is treasonable against God as 
well as against the King." 3 

In his two articles on " The Catholic Origin of 
Democracy," in Studies for March and June, 
19 19, to which the author is exceptionally indebted 
throughout this chapter, Professor Alfred Rahilly 
shows further how this same doctrine of the Di- 
vine right of kings, and their absolute autocracy in 
things temporal and spiritual, was upheld in the 
English universities of Reformation days. Only 
seven years before the " Revolution " of 1688 the 
University of Cambridge solemnly declared in its 
address to Charles II : 

We still believe and maintain that our kings derive not their 
title from the people but from God, that to Him only they are 
accountable, that it belongs not to the subjects either to create 
or censure but to honor and obey their sovereign, who comes 
to be so by a fundamental hereditary right of succession which 
no religion, no law, no fault or forfeiture can alter or di- 
minish. 4 

At the same time her sister university con- 
demned the u damnable doctrines ,f of the Jesuit 

3 Laud, "Works," V, p. 613, 614. 

4 Seller, " The History of Passive Obedience," p. 108. 



CATHOLICS AND POLITICAL DEMOCRACY 273 

Cardinal Bellarmine, and the Jesuit theologian, 
Suarez, which soon found its way into the Ameri- 
can Declaration of Independence and inspired 
democratic Englishmen with a larger concept of 
true popular liberty, though they might not know 
its source. The very same doctrine is, at the pres- 
ent writing, taught at the Gregorian University at 
Rome, and is thus compactly stated by Father C. 
Macksey, S. J., in his " De Ethica Naturally 
printed for the use of the Roman students: 

The community, constituted into a civil society, is the natural 
subject on which, of its very essence and of necessity, by the 
natural law, civil authority descends in the first place. By the 
consent of the community it subsequently passes to the subject 
by whom it is permanently and formally exercised. 5 

Ultimately, of course, all authority must be de- 
rived from God as its original source. But it is 
the doctrine of popular rights and of the consent, 
explicit or implicit, of the governed which was 
the insufferable heresy in the days of " good Queen 
Bess." The same held true of the other Reforma- 
tion countries. " All the people of the Protestant 
countries," Lord Molesworth quaintly remarked 
in 1892, " have lost their liberty since they changed 
their religion for a better." But by the fruit 
shall the tree be known. 

Yet the doctrine of democracy survived and has 
been safely handed down, not merely to the Cath- 
olic schools, but to the world at large, from the 

5 Thesis LIII. 



274 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

Middle Ages. How, we naturally wonder, has 
this come about? As the first cause, though per- 
haps not the most important, we may mention the 
gild organizations. These institutions, though 
sadly hampered, debilitated and degenerated, still 
for a time continued in existence. Norwich, the 
cradle of Congregationalism, as Professor Rahilly 
points out, was famous for its gilds as well as for 
its chartered companies. From their ordinances 
and statutes, established " by the common con- 
sent," after the same democratic methods that had 
obtained in the medieval Religious Orders, it was 
not a far cry to the Mayflower Covenant of 1620: 

The American colonists, merchant as well as religious ad- 
venturers, merely set up farther afield in untrodden soil those 
little commonwealths and bodies politic which had long existed 
in Calais and Antwerp and Bruges. Religious gilds working 
through nonconformist churches, and merchant gilds trans- 
formed into trading companies and chartered plantations, com- 
bined to produce the United States of America, whose inde- 
pendence was ultimately won not by political theories but 
largely by the prowess of those who were driven into exile by 
Puritan persecution and chartered plantations in Ireland. 6 

But it is to the writings of the Catholic school- 
men in particular that we must look for the dy- 
namic principles to which we owe the very concep- 
tion of all true modern democracy, which is purely 
a child of the Middle Ages. It was thence that 
Bellarmine and Suarez and their direct predeces- 
sors had drawn those doctrines to which our gen- 

6 Studies, June, 1919, p. 197. 



CATHOLICS AND POLITICAL DEMOCRACY 275 

uine democratic systems owe their origin. The 
44 Conferences " of Father Persons, the Jesuit, who 
was known under the name of Doleman, were the 
source, according to that strict defender of auto- 
cratic royalty, Abednego Seller, writing in 1690, 
44 whence most of our modern enemies of the true 
rights of princes have borrowed both their argu- 
ments and their authorities." The " true rights 
of princes," after the mind of good Abednego, 
were those comprised under the doctrine of the 
Divine right of kings, mercilessly demolished by 
Persons, whose book, in turn, was publicly burned 
by Oxford University, and its printer, tradition 
says, " hanged, drawn and quartered." Persons 
indignantly denounced the Reformation doctrine 
that princes are subject to no law or limitation, 
44 as though the Commonwealth had been made 
for them and not they for the Commonwealth," 
and boldly declared: 

There can be no doubt that the commonwealth hath power 
to choose their own fashion of government, as also to change 
the same upon reasonable cause. ... In like manner it is 
evident that as the commonwealth hath this authority to choose 
and change her government, so hath she also to limit the same 
with what laws and conditions she pleaseth. 7 

This obviously was no comfortable doctrine for 
the court of Elizabeth and its 44 State-ridden 
Church." 

The extreme acts of the Puritans were not jus- 

7 Ibid., 198, 199. 



276 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

tified by the teachings of the Catholic schoolmen, 
but their conception of democracy itself was de- 
rived by them from no other sources. " These 
Puritan preachers," wrote Selden in his " Table 
Talk," " if they have anything good, they have 
it out of Popish books, though they will not ac- 
knowledge it for fear of displeasing the people." 
In the same manner the Covenanters drew upon 
Jesuit authorities, while Charles I, in 1639, said 
of the Presbyterian arguments that they " are 
taken almost verbatim out of Bellarmine and 
Suarez." 8 Professor Rahilly quotes from Sam- 
uel Rutherford's " Lex Rex" which was the great 
Presbyterian armory in those strenuous days. A 
single brief passage, indeed, suffices to indicate the 
indebtedness which Rutherford vainly sought to 
deny: 

Covarruvias, Soto, and Suarez have rightly said that power 
of government is immediately from God, and this or that defi- 
nite power is mediately from God, proceeding from God by 
the mediation of the consent of a community. 9 

So too the Calvinists, " except for their oppor- 
tunist advocacy of tyrranicide . . . merely re- 
peated, and sometimes unfortunately distorted, the 
teachings of their Catholic predecessors and mas- 
ters." As a very pertinent instance reference is 
made to the Calvinist George Buchanan of whom 
it has been grandiloquently said that: " The prin- 

8 Ibid., 201-20 5. 

°Q. 2, p. 3b, Ed. 1843 



CATHOLICS AND POLITICAL DEMOCRACY 277 

ciples which he successfully floated in unpropitious 
times undoubtedly produced the two great English, 
the American, and the French Revolutions, with 
all their continuations and consequences," whereas 
he himself plainly states: " I will explain not so 
much my own view as that of the ancients." 10 
And would that he had learned his lesson far more 
thoroughly ! The same is true in the case of other 
Calvinist writers whose democracy, in France, 
came to a sudden and unprovided end when auto- 
cratic principles served their purpose better. For 
as Baudrillart says : 

If at first the French Calvinists seemed to favor liberty, it 
was only when the royal power was against them. From the 
day the heir to the throne was a Protestant they quickly cast 
all their liberal and democratic theories to the wind and began 
to preach the doctrine of absolute legitimacy and of passive 
obedience to the sovereign, whoever he may be. 11 

The Catholic writers, whose doctrines dated 
back to the Middle Ages, were not responsible for 
all the conclusions drawn from their books, yet 
they were clearly the originators of modern de- 
mocracy. Its entire structure, in so far as it is 
true and sound, rests upon the work of the Cath- 
olic schoolmen and is broadly based upon the foun- 
dations laid by medieval thinkers, both lay and 
clerical. 

10 "De jure regni apud Scotos." See Studies, March, 1919, 

PP- 14-17- 

11 " The Catholic Church, the Renaissance and Protestantism," 
p. 311. 



278 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

For a conclusive argument it is hardly necessary 
to refer to any other source than the u Patriarchal 
of Sir Robert Filmer, an ardent royalist who died 
in 1680. He not merely finds that democracy 
" was first hatched in the schools," but quotes, 
moreover, a passage from Cardinal Bellarmine as 
comprising " the strength of all that ever I have 
read or heard produced for the natural liberty on 
the subject." The following is the passage from 
the great Cardinal's " De Laicis," as translated 
by Filmer himself: 

Secular or civil power is instituted by men ; it is in the people 
unless they bestow it on a prince. This power is immediately 
in the whole multitude as in the subject of it. For this power 
is in the Divine law, but the Divine law hath given this power 
to no particular man; if the positive law is taken away, there 
is left no reason why amongst a multitude (who are equal) 
one rather than another should bear rule over the rest. Power 
is given by the multitude to one man or to more by the same 
law of nature; for the commonwealth cannot exercise this 
power, therefore it is bound to bestow it upon some one man 
or some few. It depends upon the consent of the multitude to 
ordain over themselves a king or consul or other magistrates. 
And if there be a lawful cause, the multitude may change the 
kingdom into an aristocracy or democracy. 12 

In quoting at some length from this volume 
Professor Rahilly alludes to the fact that Jeffer- 
son's own copy of it still exists in the Congres- 
sional Library, and that there certainly can be no 
doubt whatsoever that in this very citation from 
Bellarmine there " is comprised, " to adapt the 

12 Studies, June, 1919, pp. 206, 207. 



CATHOLICS AND POLITICAL DEMOCRACY 279 

words of Filmer to more recent times, " the 
strength of all that Jefferson or Mason could ever 
have read or heard produced for the natural lib- 
erty of the subject" So that the suggestion is not 
in the least far-fetched when it is hinted that these 
very citations from the Catholic schools directly 
11 influenced Mason in writing the Virginia Bill 
of Rights and Jefferson in drafting the Declara- 
tion of Independence." We can nowise doubt, 
therefore, that the democracy of the United States, 
like all other forms of sound modern democracy, 
was indirectly derived from them. In the days 
of the Reformation there was certainly no hesi- 
tation in the minds of men as to the " popish " 
origin of the " damnable doctrine " of democracy, 
nor can there be any reasonable doubt of it to- 
day. 

The expression of this democracy can be traced, 
in greater or less perfection throughout the en- 
tire period of the Middle Ages: in the great re- 
ligious orders with their systems of representa- 
tion; in the popular organizations of the gilds with 
their industrial jurisdiction sanctioned by the State ; 
in numberless city democracies that were based 
upon gild organizations and maintained their own 
self-government; in the free town-republics of Ger- 
many, in the splendid Catholic cantons of Switzer- 
land, in the independent provinces of Spain, in the 
cities of the Netherlands, and in the towns of the 
Lombard League, established in 1168 and de- 



280 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

fended so successfully in their democratic freedom 
by the great Pope Alexander III, whose memory 
still remains in the name of Alessandria. 13 

Particularly valuable as a training for democ- 
racy were the early Church councils in the various 
sections of Europe. The Council of Toledo, in 
the year 400, dealt with civil as well as ecclesias- 
tical matters and was deputed to act as the equiv- 
alent of a National Parliament for Spain. The 
Spanish people did not fail to profit by this guid- 
ance of the clergy, with the result that we find a 
virile democracy putting forth its claims in the 
independent towns of Spain early in the twelfth 
century. " For three centuries at least the or- 
ganization of the free cities was the natural out- 
let of all democratic aspirations of the people. " 14 

The spirit of democracy ever alive within the 
Catholic Church is indeed to-day acknowledged 
in places where we might least expect to find it. It 
is to this spirit of democracy that President Wilson 
means to allude when he speaks of the Catholic 
Church as " a great democracy." Referring to 
the Middle Ages, he thus writes of her in " The 
New Freedom " : 

The Roman Church was then, as it is now, a great democ- 
racy. There was no peasant so humble that he might not be- 
come Pope of Christendom; and every chancellery in Europe, 

13 J. A. Dewe, "Medieval and Modern History," p. 119. 

14 " Types of Democracy among Catholics," The Catholic Mag- 
azine for South Africa. 



CATHOLICS AND POLITICAL DEMOCRACY 28 1 

every court in Europe, was ruled by these learned, trained and 
accomplished men, the priesthood of that great and dominant 
body. What kept government alive in the Middle Ages was 
this constant rise of the sap from the bottom, from the rank and 
file of the great body of the people through the open channels 
of the priesthood. 15 

Most interesting of all is the testimony of Dr. 
Paul Rohrbach, who in " The German Idea in 
the World " widely distributed during the World 
War, attacked the Catholic Church, because by 
its spirit of democracy it impeded the propaga- 
tion of the idea of imperialistic autocracy. " The 
religio-democratic pulse which at the present 
time beats in Catholicism, at least here in Ger- 
many," he wrote, " contributes to the weakness of 
German ideals." No more glorious tribute could 
have been given to the Catholics of Germany, and 
to the Catholic Church throughout the world. 

It was owing solely to the doctrine and influ- 
ence of the Church that, as W. S. Lilly says: 
14 The notion of unlimited dominion, of Caesarism, 
autocratic or democratic — perhaps the most bane- 
ful manifestation of human selfishness — had no 
place among its political conceptions, which re- 
garded authority as limited and fiduciary: nor did 
it allow of absolutism in property." 16 

Attention should finally be called here to the 
many resemblances between the Government of 
the United States and the government of the 

* 5 Pp. 85, 86. 

16 " Christianity and Modern Civilization," pp. 160, 161. 



2 82 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

Catholic Church, wherever the spirit of democ- 
racy finds its truest expression. In the words of 
the Rt. Rev. John P. Carroll, D.D. : 

The government of the Church.has many points of resemblance 
with our own republican form of government. The Pope, like 
the President, is elected. Bishops are appointed by the Pope, but 
only after the priests and bishops of the territory concerned are 
heard, just as justices of the Supreme Court and Federal judges 
are appointed by the President, but not without the approval of 
the United States Senate. The Ecumenical Council, the supreme 
law-making body in the Church, made up of the Pope and the 
Bishops, resembles the American Congress, composed of dele- 
gates from the various States, with the President at their head. 
The Pope's college of Cardinals is like the President's Cabinet. 
The members of the Cabinet are the heads of various depart- 
ments of the administration, just as the Cardinals in the Roman 
Curia are heads of the various Congregations which transact 
the business of the Universal Church. Every American citizen 
has access to the supreme tribunal at Washington. So the hum- 
blest child of the Church has the right of appeal to the highest 
court in Rome, and no question is decided until it has been given 
the fullest consideration. 

Dr. Charles Phineas Sherman in his three 
volumes on " Roman Law in the Modern World M 
traces the conception of modern liberty to the 
Catholic Canon Law and to St. Thomas and the 
Catholic schools. His theory that these them- 
selves derived it from Roman civil law is un- 
founded, since the latter has merely been used as 
the support of modern autocracy. To sum up 
therefore the conclusions arrived at here we can 
do no better than to refer once more to the first 
of the articles by Professor Alfred Rahilley: 



CATHOLICS AND POLITICAL DEMOCRACY 283 

" Such then are the seed-thoughts and the em- 
bryo-outlines of democracy which we owe to Cath- 
olic civilization and culture. The great Church 
Councils for over eight centuries slowly trained Eu- 
rope in the theory and practice of self-govern- 
ment, finally eventuating in commune, cortes, par- 
liament and states-general. The organization of 
the Church — the representation of cathedral and 
collegiate chapters, the appointment of proctors, 
above all the democracy of the friars — showed 
the way to secular States. The discussions con- 
cerning the structure of the Church formed for 
nearly three centuries the great polemic of the 
West and thus inaugurated and habituated in men's 
minds those categories of political thought whose 
inheritors we are to-day. And all the while there 
flowed that stream of deep, patient thinkers who, 
from Thomas of Aquino, Nicholas d' Oresme, 
Antonius of Florence, down to Almain, Major, 
Bellarmine and Suarez, upheld the ideal of popu- 
lar rights and government by consent. It was the 
ideas of these men to which the Catholics of the 
Ligue made their appeal; and notwithstanding 
their vehemence and passion, their ideals were 
sound. It was to this same treasure house of the 
past that the French Calvinists turned in their first 
and short-lived alliance with democracy. And it 
was back once more to the rock whence they were 
hewn that the Covenanters and Presbyterians 
turned when the day of reckoning came for the 



284 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

Stuarts. From the annals of the past, from Brac- 
ton and Fortescue, from forgotten canonists, 
legists and schoolmen, from the great conciliar 
controversialists, were dragged forth principles 
which shattered forever the Reformation tenet of 
Divine Right and traversing the ocean founded the 
American Republic, principles whose dynamic pos- 
sibilities and far-reaching consequences are not yet 
exhausted." 

It is no surprise, therefore, to read the state- 
ment by Pope Benedict XV to Cardinal Lucon, 
according to the report in the New York Sun, 
September 8, 19 19: 

The great outstanding fact in the world to-day is the ever- 
strengthening current everywhere toward democracy. The pro- 
letariat classes, as they are called, having taken a preponderant 
part in the war, desire in every country to derive therefrom the 
maximum advantage. . . . The Catholic Church has always 
loved those who suffer and has always taught that public power 
established for the common good must work especially to 
improve conditions for those who suffer. That is why the 
Catholic clergy must not oppose the proletarian revindications, 
but must favor them, provided they remain within the limits 
of honesty and justice. 

Good words these, and just as good is the 
Pope's caution against the excesses of those who 
11 to the detriment of everybody would overturn 
the social order which human nature renders neces- 
sary." The spirit of democracy breathes no- 
where more freely than within the Catholic 
Church. 



CHAPTER XXVII 

MODERN CATHOLIC GILD PROGRAM 

OF all the constructive labor movements 
that at the close of the war are sweeping 
over the world in a mighty wave of in- 
dustrial unrest, there is not one whose leaders are 
not inspired by the supreme idea of labor organ- 
ization. Trade unionism and the cooperative 
movement, Syndicalism and the groupings of the 
I. W. W., gild Socialism and the Soviet system are 
but different and often hostile phases of the same 
world-wide labor agitation that is steadily gather- 
ing to a crest and moving on with impetuous force. 
Law-abiding or opposed to all authority, Christian 
or relentlessly determined on the destruction of 
all religious beliefs, these various movements still 
conform with one another in a vague acceptance 
of the gild idea. 

Anarchism cannot be reckoned among the 
world's constructive forces. Though it may 
blend with other movements and even for the time 
adopt their purposes, it remains, as its name im- 
plies, a pure negation. Its immediate object is 
neither more nor less than the annihilation of the 
entire existing order of society. Out of the ashes 
of the old world, sunk in flame and ruin, a new or- 

285 



2 86 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

der is phenix-like to arise in liberty, youth and 
beauty. Destruction is sufficient for to-day. The 
morrow will provide for itself. Such was the 
principle of its founder, Bakounin. The construc- 
tive ideas that its ardent champions claim for it 
are nothing more than a mere general license, 
with no authority of God or man to hold it in 
restraint. 

Socialism, too, while allied with a thousand 
plans that are not of its own origin or being, con- 
tains but one vague constructive thought: The 
more or less common ownership of the means of 
production and distribution. How far this shall 
be effected, how it shall be carried out, and what 
shall be its future details, no one is qualified to say. 
We do not marvel, therefore, that Socialism has 
been the prolific breeding place of every variety of 
radical thought. Countless numbers of its lead- 
ers, and of its rank and file have steadily drifted to 
the gild idea, which many of its own members now 
conceive to be the only practical working plan. 

Men realize that the outcome of Socialism can 
be nothing but tyranny. This was again fully 
evinced in its ultimate development, Bolshevism. 
Speaking of the philosophy of the Russian Bol- 
shevists, the American Secretary of Labor, the 
Hon. William B. Wilson, rightly said: 

The will of the majority is as objectionable to them as it 
was to the Kaistr or the Tsar. It establishes a dictatorship on 
the plea that the autocrat knows better what is best for the people 



MODERN CATHOLIC _GILD PROGRAM 287 

than they themselves know. It sets up a close dictatorship which 
demands obligatory labor service. The worker sacrifices his 
own free will. Whether he likes his employment or not — what- 
ever may be his desire to move, he cannot do so, without per- 
mission of the dictator. He cannot change the conditions of his 
employment, he must not quit, because of the merciless " dicta- 
torship of individuals for definite processes of work." 

This dictatorship would control the courts which are to be 
used as a means of discipline that will consider responsibility 
for the " pangs of famine and unemployment to be visited upon 
those who fail to produce bread for men and fuel for industry." 

The public press is to be systematically repressed or con- 
trolled. Nothing is to reach the attention of the masses except 
that which has been prepared for them. 

The gild system, then, under one form or an- 
other, is doubtless the most important social sug- 
gestion for our own time, and indeed for any stage 
of industrial development. It is the one unfailing 
means of self-help that labor possesses. The first 
true conception of the craft-gild idea was given to 
the world by the Catholic Church. We are not 
therefore surprised that in assigning the causes of 
our modern social disorders Pope Leo XIII sig- 
nificantly singled out before all others the aboli- 
tion of the gilds : " For the ancient working- 
men's gilds were abolished in the last century, and 
no other organization took their place." * So, 
too, in the work of reconstruction he naturally 
placed the greatest stress upon their speedy res- 
toration. It will be easy for working men to 
solve aright the question of the hour, he tells 

lu On the Condition of the Working Classes." See A. C 
Breig, " Papal Program of Social Reform," p. 10. 



288 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

them, " if they will form associations, choose wise 
guides and follow on the path which with so much 
advantage to themselves and the commonwealth 
was trodden by their fathers before them." 2 The 
utmost betterment of the condition of each indi- 
vidual member " in body, mind and property," 3 
is the purpose for which these gilds are to be 
founded. But for their success religion is as es- 
sential to-day as in the days of old. It is true 
that the outline of these new organizations drawn 
by Pope Leo in his Encyclical on " The Condition 
of the Working Classes," is suggestive merely of 
an ideal Christian labor unionism, such as alone 
was practical at the time of his writing. This 
does not preclude a far closer approximation to 
the medieval gild system. He purposely refrains 
from adding more specific details, since the latter, 
as he wisely remarks, must of necessity vary with 
time, and place, and circumstances: 

We do not judge it expedient to enter into minute particulars 
touching the subject of organization: this must depend on na- 
tional character, on practice and experience, on the nature and 
aim of the work to be done, on the scope of the various trades 
and employments, and on other circumstances of fact and of 
time: all of which should be carefully considered. 4 

Following the example of his predecessor, Pope 
Pius X, too, called attention above all to the need 

2 Ibid., p. 56. 

8 Ibid., pp. 53. 54. 

4 Ibid., p. 53. 



MODERN CATHOLIC GILD PROGRAM 289 

of workingmen's unions. He, too, reminded men 
that social science is not of yesterday, that no new 
civilization is to be invented and no city to be 
built in the clouds; that the successful organizations 
established in the past, under the wise coopera- 
tion of Church and State, are of far more than 
historic interest. Writing to the Archbishops and 
Bishops of France, he thus instructed them in this 
regard: 

It will be enough to take up again, with the help of true 
workers for social restoration, the organisms broken by the 
Revolution, and to adapt them to the new situation created by 
the material evolution of contemporary society in the same 
Christian spirit which of old inspired them. For the true 
friends of the people are neither revolutionists, nor innovators, 
but traditionalists. 5 

Urgently as he recommends the gild ideal, his 
greatest stress is placed upon the need of adapta- 
tion, the need of carefully availing ourselves of 
" all the practical methods furnished at the pres- 
ent day by progress in social and economic 
studies." This thought is even more clearly ex- 
pressed in his letter to the Bishops of Italy, June 
11, 1905 : 

It is impossible at the present day to reestablish in the same 
form all the institutions which may have been useful, and were 
even the only efficient ones in past centuries, so numerous are 
the radical modifications which time has brought to society and 
life, and so many are the fresh needs which changing circum- 

5 Letter to Archbishops and Bishops of France, August 25, 
1910. 



29O DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

stances cease not to call forth. But the Church throughout her 
long history has always and on every occasion luminously shown 
that she possesses a wonderful power of adaptation to the vary- 
ing conditions of civil society, without injury to the integrity 
or immutability of faith or morals. 6 

For a brief but complete summary of all that 
has hitherto been said we may turn to the Encycli- 
cal of Leo XIII on " The Condition of the Work- 
ing Classes." Referring to the various associa- 
tions and organizations that can be created for the 
benefit of the laborer, he concludes: 

The most important of all are workingmen's unions; for these 
virtually include all the rest. History attests what excellent 
results were brought about by the craft gilds of olden times. 
They were the means of affording not only many advantages 
to the workingmen, but in no small degree of promoting the 
advancement of art, as numerous monuments remain to bear 
witness. Such unions should be suited to the requirements of 
this our age, an age of wider education, of different habits, and 
of far more numerous requirements in daily life. 7 

But neither Leo XIII nor Pius X could have 
foreseen the rapidity with which social develop- 
ments were accelerated by the stirring events of 
the World War. The slow material evolution of 
centuries was then compressed within as many 
years of energetic, throbbing life, of revolutionary 
and often misdirected social action. Yet it was 
all finally to aid in bringing the world nearer to 
the ideals of the Middle Ages, in making possible 

6 " On Christian Social Reform," Catholic Social Guild Pam- 
phlets, pp. 18, 19. 

7 Cnf. Breig, p. 48. 



MODERN CATHOLIC GILD PROGRAM 29 1 

a closer approximation of the Catholic gild sys- 
tem than even Leo XIII, with all his marvelous 
insight into the social developments of the fu- 
ture, could have considered feasible. He has not, 
however, failed to leave provision for even this 
situation. We need but turn again to the final 
norm by which, as he says, every labor organiza- 
tion of the future must be tested and found true 
or wanting: 

To sum up, then, we may lay it down as a general and last- 
ing law, that workingmen's associations should be so organized 
and governed as to furnish the best and most suitable means for 
attaining what is aimed at, that is to say, for helping each in- 
dividual member to better his condition to the utmost in body, 
mind and property. 8 

This ideal was strictly kept in view in the pro- 
gram of social reconstruction drawn up by the Ad- 
ministrative Committee of the National Catholic 
War Council, January, 19 19, and later incorpo- 
rated in the Congressional Record of the United 
States. That suggestions occur here which were 
never formally included in the Encyclicals of Leo 
XIII or Pius X need not startle anyone. They 
are not the less surely contained in that " general 
and lasting law " of the great " Pope of the Work- 
ingmen " which was just quoted. In the recon- 
structive program, stamped with the seal of' the 
Hierarchy of the United States, can be found the 
consummation of the gild idea. In their most 
vital passage the Bishops say: 

8 Ibid., pp. $3, 54- 



292 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

The full possibilities of increased production will not be 
realized so long as the majority of the workers remain mere 
wage-earners. The majority must somehow become owners, or 
at least in part, of the means of production. They can be 
enabled to reach this stage gradually through cooperative pro- 
ductive societies and copartnership arrangements. In the for- 
mer the workers own and manage the industries themselves; 
in the latter they own a substantial part of the corporate stock 
and exercise a reasonable share in the management. However 
slow the attainment of these ends they will have to be reached 
before we can have a thoroughly efficient system of production, 
or an industrial social order that will be secure from the danger 
of revolution. 9 

Such is the aim of the new Catholic gild sys- 
tem. No one maintains that these developments 
are possible without wisely directed labor organi- 
zations, both where there is question of establish- 
ing cooperative productive societies — a true gild 
ideal — or of merely sharing in the management 
of industries, obviously through the representa- 
tives of craft gilds. Such, too, is clearly the mean- 
ing of the Bishops, who strongly vindicate the right 
of labor " to organize and to deal with employers 
through representatives," and heartily approve of 
the establishment of shop committees, u working 
wherever possible with the trade union." 10 That 
such methods will imply " to a great extent the 
abolition of the wage-system," they candidly con- 
fess, but their main purpose is the increase of 

9 " Social Reconstruction." Reconstruction Pamphlets, No. I, 
p. 22. 

10 Ibid., p. 19. 



MODERN CATHOLIC GILD PROGRAM 293 

private productive ownership and so the most per- 
fect attainment of the supreme gild ideal proposed 
by Leo XIII: the betterment of the condition of 
each individual member " to the utmost in body, 
mind and property." In the words of Pope Pius 
X, they are " neither revolutionists, nor innova- 
tors, but traditionalists." And with these great 
Pontiffs they, too, understand that no program of 
labor can be finally successful that is not inspired 
by true religious ideals. Here is the great need 
of the future. 



CHAPTER XXVIII 

THE GREAT CATASTROPHE 

THE Reformation, as every intelligent and 
impartial student of history will now 
freely admit, was not primarily a re- 
ligious, but an economic revolution. It took root, 
as a non-Catholic clergyman recently expressed it 
to the writer, in autocracies only. It relied en- 
tirely upon the favor of the powerful secular lords, 
who gladly disguised their personal greed and am- 
bition under the cloak of religion. The poor, as 
even men like Harnack confess, were to be the 
great sufferers. " Politically and socially/' writes 
Dr. Cram, " the inevitable outcome of the Renais- 
sance and Reformation was absolutism and tyr- 
anny, with force as the one recognized arbiter of 
action." 1 That such statements are matters of 
fact that can no longer give offense to open-minded 
Protestants shows the progress that has been made 
towards a better understanding of history. 

It is equally admitted by Catholics, in their own 
regard, that grave abuses existed at this time 
in the Church, not doctrinally, since her teaching 
has never changed since the days of the Apostles, 
but on the part of many of her members. In 

i " The Sins of the Fathers/' p. 9. 

294 



THE GREAT CATASTROPHE 295 

England and in Germany, the two great Reforma- 
tion countries, the Church was suffering at the 
same time both from a plethora of wealth and an 
anemia of poverty. A vast proportion of the 
landed property of these countries had been gath- 
ered into the hands of ecclesiastical lords who 
often took but little interest in the welfare of the 
souls entrusted to their care. Abbeys and con- 
vents were not unfrequently tinctured with world- 
liness. In the mean time deserving priests were, 
in too many instances, but poorly and inadequately 
provided for. Such conditions lent themselves ad- 
mirably to the caustic pen of the satirist and the 
misdirected attacks of the reformer. The fault, 
where it existed, was not that of religion, but of 
politics. It was not a question of the Church in- 
terfering with the State, but the time-worn story 
of the State interfering with the Church. As 
Cardinal Gasquet writes of the time of Henry 
VIII: 

The bishops were, with some honorable exceptions, chosen by- 
royal favor rather than for spiritual qualifications. However 
personally good they may have been, they were not ideal pas- 
tors of their flocks. Place-seeking, too, often kept many of the 
lords spiritual at court, that they might gain or maintain in- 
fluence sufficient to support their claims to further preferment. 
The occupation of bishops over much in the affairs of the na- 
tion, besides its evident effect on the state of clerical discipline, 
had another result. It created in the minds of the new nobility 
a jealous opposition to ecclesiastics, and a readiness to humble 
the power of the Church by passing measures in restraint of its 
ancient liberties. 2 

2 " The Last Abbot of Glastonbury," pp. 25, 26. 



296 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

Similar precisely was the dark side of the pic- 
ture in Germany, as presented by Janssen, a most 
impartial historian. Men had in many instances 
flagrantly failed to observe the teachings of the 
Church, and avarice became the besetting sin of 
the day. Neither had the clergy themselves al- 
ways been loyal to the spirit of their Divine Mas- 
ter and the high ideals of the Sermon on the 
Mount: 

The lower orders of parochial clergy, whose merely nominal 
stipends were derived from the many precarious tithes, were 
often compelled by poverty, if not tempted by avarice, to work 
at some trade which was quite inconsistent with their position, 
and which exposed them to the contempt of their parishioners. 
The higher ecclesiastical orders, on the other hand, enjoyed 
abundant and superfluous wealth, which many of them had no 
scruple of parading in such an offensive manner as to provoke 
the indignation of the people, the jealousy of the upper classes, 
and the scorn of all serious minds. 3 

Here then we have plainly stated the worst 
side of the case. Moral delinquencies were ob- 
viously not wanting, and we must add in fine, as 
Cardinal Manning suggests, the distraction caused 
shortly before in the minds of men by the great 
Western Schism. 

But this is not the entire picture, nor does it in 
any way represent the Church herself. Ham- 
pered by the evil of State interference which 
thrust into the place of the chosen shepherds of 
her flock worldly-minded princes and court favor- 

8 " History of the German People," II, p. 293. 



THE GREAT CATASTROPHE 297 

ites, she still continued as before in her work of 
charity and in her fearless vindication of the prin- 
ciples of social justice, while preaching the pure 
Gospel of Christ as she had done in the centuries 
past. Sanctity had not departed from her relig- 
ious orders because some of their members had' 
fallen into laxity, nor was zeal for the cause of 
God and of his poor less truly the dominant char- 
acteristic of the Church because some of her pas- 
tors had been found unworthy. 

It was but the fulfilment of Christ's prophecy 
that the tares should be permitted to grow up 
with the wheat, and that the net of His Church 
should hold alike the good and the bad until the 
time of final separation. So it has always been 
from the days of the Apostles, and so it will re- 
main. But it is also true that there are periods 
of more than usual delinquency. Such was the 
case in the years immediately preceding the " Re- 
formation." Unhappily, in place of seeking to 
conform the lives of men more perfectly to the 
true Faith of their fathers, a new religion was sub- 
stituted in its stead. Here, as is now more clearly 
seen than ever before, was the beginning of all our 
economic evils. Ralph Adams Cram thus briefly 
states the case : 

For 300 years, generation after generation has been fed on 
the shameless fiction of historians and theologians until it is 
bred in the bone that the Reformation, the suppression of the 
monasteries, the Huguenot revolt, etc., were godly acts that 



298 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

formed the everlasting cornerstones of modern civilization. 
They were: but what that civilization was we are now finding 
out and paying for at a price never exacted before since Im- 
perial Rome paid in the same coin. 4 

To have these facts made clear in the minds of 
men, and to know that such statements can no 
longer be looked upon with suspicion, as the prod- 
uct of Catholic zeal or of an artistic or intellectual 
partiality for medievalism, is a distinct gain, eco- 
nomically no less than culturally. As Muezzin 
writes in the London Athenaum: 

Man in the Middle Ages somehow held the clue to a happi- 
ness and a harmony that we have lost. Life had a meaning 
for him which transcended the desires of the flesh and the 
promptings of self-interest; his universe was charged with in- 
telligible and blessed purpose; and his work, which was con- 
secrated to the service of that meaning and that purpose, was 
crowned with such exuberance of joy and beauty that the ca- 
thedrals, abbeys and churches of his creation tease us moderns 
out of thought, so sublime they seem, so unattainable to the 
more accomplished, more learned craftsman of to-day. 5 

The greater accomplishment and learning of the 
modern laborer, where this may be said to exist, 
is merely upon the surface. Culturally the 
medieval craftsman was immeasurably superior to 
the average workman of to-day. Education is of 
the whole man, and such an education the medieval 
craftsman enjoyed in his religion and his churches, 
as well as in his gilds and his craft. The most 

4 "The Sins of the Fathers," p. 96. 

5 May, 1917, p. 223. 



THE GREAT CATASTROPHE 299 

striking and obvious fact of these ages, as the 
writer last quoted remarks, is " the universality 
of the feeling and appreciation for beauty." 
Beauty dwelled with men and walked with them 
and found expression at their touch. The things 
of the spirit were then shared by all and expressed 
by all. " Those prayers in stone, which are so 
marvelous in the eyes of posterity, were not built 
by highly paid specialists, but by the common peo- 
ple themselves, who enriched their handiwork with 
a thousand blossoms of their quaint and untutored 
imagination." 6 Such was the perfection of dem- 
ocratic industry, its flower, and glory, and joy. 

11 In those times and in that society the trinity 
of the human spirit, beauty, truth and love, was 
a trinity in unity," the unity of one Catholic Faith. 
All this was swept away by the Reformation, 
through the instrumentality of autocratic rulers to 
whose grasping greed the people were mercilessly 
delivered, to fall an easy prey, subsequently, to the 
no less merciless autocracy of that capitalism which 
now was given birth. 

The sickness which had broken out in the social 
organism, previous to the Reformation, was not 
unto death, nor did it at all effect the entire body. 
This still remained sound. A local remedy only 
was needed. Luther himself was forced sadly to 
admit on many an occasion that the cities of Ger- 
many which most eagerly welcomed him had 

6 Ibid. 



300 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

changed for the worse after accepting his " New 
Evangel." 7 The same can clearly be shown to 
have been the case in England, where the Com- 
mons became the laboring poor, 8 and in every 
other land into which the Reformation entered. 
Catholic countries were in many cases hardly less 
affected by the reflex of the disastrous economic 
doctrines which now gained ground as the corol- 
lary to the new religious theory of individualism. 
In too many instances the State, though nominally 
Catholic, hampered the Church in every way and 
made impossible her free social activity, while the 
false principles, imported from abroad, confused 
the minds of men. Hence the universality of the 
social disorder, as wide-spread as had once been 
the beneficent influence of the Church. 

The width and breadth and depth of the eco- 
nomic disaster implied in the Reformation is only 
now beginning to be understood. " We talk with 
a great deal of indignation of the Tweed ring," 
says a Protestant divine, the Rev. Dr. Jessopp, in 
" The Great Pillage," " the day will come when 
some one will write the story of two other rings: 
the ring of the miscreants who robbed the mon- 
asteries in the reign of Henry VIII was the first; 

7 " Now that one devil has been driven out, seven others, 
worse than the former, have entered into us, as we can see in 
princes, lords, nobles, burghers, and peasants!" — Luther's words 
in 1529. (Erlangen Edition, xxxvi, p. 411.) "What Luther 
Taught," Chapter IV. 

8 Cobbett. 



THE GREAT CATASTROPHE 301 

but the ring of the robbers who robbed the poor 
and helpless in the reign of Edward VI was ten 
times worse than the first." 

From the closing of the monasteries, as the 
havens of all human miseries and the open inns 
of God's poor, the world has never recovered: 

They burnt the homes of the shaven men, that had been quaint 

and kind, 
Till there was no bed in a monk's house, nor food that man 

could find 
The inns of God where no man paid, that were the walls of 

the weak, 
The King's Servants ate them all. And still we did not speak. 

So sang Chesterton of the first of the great 
deeds of pillage which took place at the same time 
with the looting of the churches, and whose 
spiritual consequences extended with the most 
dreadful results into the domain of economics. 
The second act was the robbing of the gild prop- 
erty devoted to religious purposes, which prac- 
tically implied a complete act of confiscation, since 
the great funds which the gilds devoted to works 
of charity and similar objects, were intimately as- 
sociated with religion and held and administered 
in its name. Hence the writer upon " Gilds " in 
the non-Catholic " Encyclopedia of Religion and 
Ethics" rightly affirms that: " The Reforma- 
tion by disendowing the religious and social gilds 
and crippling the organization of the craft gilds, 
prepared the way for Poor Law reform and the 



302 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

changes in the industrial revolution which were 
then shaping." The immediate consequences of 
the royal pillage are thus forcefully described by 
Dr. Jessopp : 

Almshouses in which old men and women were fed and 
clothed were robbed to the last pound, the poor alms-folk being 
turned out into the cold at an hour's warning to beg their 
bread. Hospitals for the sick and needy, sometimes magnifi- 
cently provided with nurses and chaplains, whose very raison 
d'etre was that they were to look after and care for those who 
were past caring for themselves — these were stripped of all 
their belongings, the inmates sent out to hobble into some con- 
venient dry ditch to lie down and die in, or to crawl into some 
barn or hovel there to be tended, not without fear of conse- 
quences, by some kindly man or woman who could not bear 
to see a suffering fellow creature drop down and die at their 
own doorposts. 

The same results followed in Germany, and 
Luther's complaints that people, after adopting 
the " true M religion of his own making no longer 
interested themselves in charity as they had done 
before, were unavailing. The princes and their 
hirelings had eaten up and spent in horses, lux- 
uries and vices the dowries of the poor. The 
people had no mind to replace them. " We wish 
to do nothing but take and rob by force what oth- 
ers have given and founded, " Luther exclaimed 
regretfully of the work begun by him. 10 

The looting of the gilds began with the act of 
Parliament of Henry VIII entitled: "An acte 

»"The Great Pillage." 
^Erlangen Ed., XLIII, p. 164. 



THE GREAT CATASTROPHE 303 

for dissolucion of colleges, chauntries, and free 
chapelles, at the king's majestie's pleasure," and 
was brought to its completion in the next reign 
when the new act, 1 Edward VI, c. XIV, de- 
manded that: " All payments by corporations, 
misteryes or craftes, for priests' obits and lamps," 
be thenceforth given to the king. The law itself 
was entitled: " An acte whereby certaine chaun- 
tries, colleges, free chapells and the possessions 
of the same be given to the king's majestic" 
Writing of the effect of these acts, in his work on 
" The Livery Companies of London," William 
Herbert says: 

The effects of the Reformation were severely felt by the 
livery companies. It had been customary in making gifts and 
devises to these societies in Catholic times, to charge such gifts 
with annual payments, for supporting chauntries for the souls 
of the respective donors; and as scarcely an atom of property 
was left without being so restricted, at a period when the sup- 
posed efficacy of these religious establishments formed part of 
the national belief, almost the whole of the companies' Trust 
Estates became liable, at the Reformation, to change masters 
with the change of religion. 11 

What was true of these companies, which rep- 
resented the wealthier middle class, was all the 
more true of the ordinary craft gild. " The 
powers of the gilds," Professor Cunningham be- 
lieves, " had been so much affected by the legisla- 
tion of Edward VI that they had but little influ- 
ence for good or evil." 12 Professor Cheyney con- 

11 P. "3. 

" " Modern Times," Part I, p. 26. 



304 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

siders it the heaviest blow inflicted on the gilds. 13 
Enormous loans were next exacted of the com- 
panies and a number of u sponging expedients " 
resorted to, by which, as William Herbert says: 
" That 4 mother of her people,' Elizabeth, and 
afterwards James and Charles, contrived to screw 
from the companies their wealth." 14 When 
forced loans and levies had been pushed as far 
as they would go, Elizabeth granted " patents for 
monopolies and for the oversight and control of 
different trades." Thus in 1590 one of the 
Queen's courtiers, Edward Darcy, sued and ob- 
tained a patent against a Leathersellers' Company. 
This empowered him to set his seal upon all the 
leather that was to be sold in England, for which 
" he sometimes received the tenth part, the ninth 
part, the seventh, the sixth, the fourth, and some- 
times, and often, the third part of the value of 
the commodity." 15 We are not therefore sur- 
prised that the establishment of gilds was still en- 
couraged in Elizabeth's reign. They were a con- 
stant srource of revenue to the crown or the cour- 
tiers. The gilds were not discontinued at once 
with the Reformation; many of them sufficiently 
recovered from the confiscation of their property 
after redeeming it at a high cost, but their eco- 
nomic efficiency was a thing of the past. This is 

13 " Industrial and Social History," p. 158. 

14 Herbert, op. cit., p. 119. 

15 Stype's Stow, II, 293. W. Herbert. 



THE GREAT CATASTROPHE 305 

the one fact to be borne in mind. They now 
gradually passed away or became mere capitalistic 
societies. Their soul was reft from them with 
their religion. 

The way was now open, both for political au- 
tocracy and for individualistic capitalism. What 
followed is too well known to call for description 
here. The domestic system, the factory system 
and the industrial revolution are the successive 
mile stones. With each step forward towards a 
loudly acclaimed national prosperity, the toiling 
masses were ground more helplessly beneath the 
feet of that merciless idol of modern commercial- 
ism to which the Reformation had surrendered 
them. In breaking with Catholicism, as Dr. 
Ralph Adams Cram wisely analyzes the process 
that now took place, religion and all spiritual in- 
terests and principles were separated from the eco- 
nomic and material phases of life : 

The division was not avowed, indeed, particularly during 
the Puritan regime; it was part of the system that religion and 
life should be more aggressively at one than at any time since 
the earlier theocracy of the Hebrews. Under the Common- 
wealth in England, the Puritan tyranny in New England, and 
the capitalistic autocracy in Great Britain, it was practically 
impossible to draw a line between Church and State; super- 
ficially it seemed as if the identity, or rather cooperation, was 
more perfect than at any time during the Catholic Middle Ages. 
Certainly the abuses of power, the gross infractions of liberty, 
the negation of even rudimentary justice in legislation, in law 
and in society, that followed from this apparent union, were 
more aggravated and intolerable. As a matter of fact, however, 



306 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

the alliance was only between a formal and public religion and 
the equally formal machinery of government; it did not extend 
to the individual, and here, in his domestic, social, business 
and political relations, the severance was almost complete. The 
typical figure in Protestantism is Luther, preaching a lofty 
doctrine of personal union with God, and conniving at bigamy, 
adultery and the massacre of starving peasants; and the pious 
iron-master or mill magnate of Badford or Leeds, zealously 
supporting his favorite form of Evangelicalism, pouring out his 
money for the support of missions to heathen countries or for 
the abolition of slavery, enforcing the strictest Sabbatarianism 
in his own household — and fighting in Parliament and through 
the press for the right to continue to employ little children of 
six years old in his mines, crawling on all fours, half naked, 
dragging carts of coal by ropes around their tender bodies, or 
to profit, by the threat of starvation, through mill hands whose 
wages were a miserable pittance, insufficient to keep body and 
soul together, and who were forbidden under penalty of the 
law to combine with one another for self-protection. 16 

The industrial slavery that fettered the city- 
laborer after the Reformation can be paralleled 
only by the injustice perpetrated upon the land. 
Reference has already been made to Outhwaite's 
treatise 17 which tells how the tenements of Glas- 
gow were crowded, " because 3,600,000 acres had 
been turned into silent sanctuaries for the red 
deer." So the English farmer was driven to the 
slums of London to yield place to the Rothschild 
stag-hounds. At the diet of Mecklenburg, in 
1607, as Dollinger informs us, the peasants were 
declared mere ciphers. They could be robbed at 
pleasure of the acres their forefathers had pos- 

16 " The Sins of the Fathers," pp. 94, 95. 

17 Chapter XXV. 



THE GREAT CATASTROPHE 307 

sessed. They were reduced to a slavery which 
differed from that of the blacks in no respect ex- 
cept that they might not be taken from their fam- 
ilies and sold to the highest bidder. " Yet this 
law was often eluded and the serfs were often 
trafficked like horses or cows." 18 

Basing his statements upon the facts gathered 
by Dollinger, Alfred Baudrillart, of the French 
Academy, thus summarizes the conditions of the 
European peasantry as the effect of the Reforma- 
tion: 

The introduction of the Reformation in Pomerania caused the 
introduction of a similar slavery. The law of 1616 decreed 
that all peasants were serfs without claims of any sort 
Preachers were obliged to denounce from their pulpits the peas- 
ants who had taken flight. ... In Sweden the liberty of the 
peasants was the price the King paid for the assistance of the 
nobility in the accomplishment of the religious revolution. In 
Denmark and in Norway the nobles followed this example. 
In Denmark the peasant was subjected to serfdom like a dog. 
"Enforced labor," says the historian Allen, "was increased 
arbitrarily, the peasants were treated like serfs." As late as 
1804, personal liberty was granted to 20,000 ^families of serfs. 
. . . In Scandinavia, as in Germany, Lutheranism was advan- 
tageous to the sovereign and the aristocracy only. 19 

But could this catastrophe have been averted by 
the Church? It certainly could have been. As 
John L. and Barbara Hammond state the case in 
their book " The Town Laborer " : 

18 Baudrillart, " The Catholic Church, the Renaissance and 
Protestantism," p. 308 ; Boll, " Histoire de Mecklembourg "; Dol- 
linrer, " Kirche und KirchenJ* 

19 Op. cit., pp. 308, 309, 312. 



308 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

Religion in one form or another, might have checked this 
spirit by rescuing society from a materialistic interpretation, in- 
sisting on the conception of man as an end in himself (i. e. t 
dependently upon God), and refusing to surrender that revela- 
tion to any science of politics or any law of trade. Such a force 
was implicit in the medieval religion that had disappeared, 
good and bad elements alike, at the Reformation. 20 

It had not indeed disappeared with the Refor- 
mation, but its voice had for the time been disre- 
garded in the political and economic life of the 
nations. There was nothing " bad " in the ele- 
ments of this religion itself. The evil was all, 
then as now, in the hearts of men and in their 
want of conformity to its teachings. By the un- 
happy separation from the Church founded by 
Christ upon Peter men had lost the one and only 
authority that could with certainty guide and di- 
rect them in the principles of social justice and of 
charity. Under Catholicism, however unworthy 
individual representatives of the Church might at 
times be found, the principles which they were 
obliged to admit and to teach ever embodied the 
true spirit of Christian brotherhood. There was 
consequently not merely the possibility, but the 
moral certainty of reform. 

As a teaching body, the clergy remained true to 
the unadulterated Gospel of Christ. The doc- 
trine of the Church insisted upon the rights of 
the workingman, the just and reasonable distri- 

20 " The Town Laborer, 1760-1832," pp. 328, 329. 



THE GREAT CATASTROPHE 309 

bution of earthly goods, and the universal law of 
helpfulness and brotherly love. It repudiated the 
claim of the capitalist to dispose at pleasure of his 
property, without regard to the common good, 
and denied in all its phases the theory of the false 
modern individualism, while offering the fullest 
liberty to all true individual development in every 
sphere of endeavor. So, too, the monk was kept 
within his strict, but voluntary, vow of poverty 
and the ecclesiastic might not appropriate at his 
mere will the proceeds of rich benefices without 
considering the poor. To all alike was applied 
the principle, so clearly expressed by St. Thomas 
in the famous passage quoted by Pope Leo XIII 
in his labor encyclical: " Man should not con- 
sider his outward possessions as his own, but as 
common to all, so as to share with them without 
difficulty when others are in need." This doc- 
trine has found its practical industrial expression 
for our own times in the concluding words of the 
pastoral on " Social Reconstruction " by the 
American Bishops: 

The laborer's right to a decent livelihood is the first moral 
charge upon industry. The employer has a right to get a 
reasonable living out of his business, but he has no right to in- 
terest on his investment until his employees have obtained at 
least living wages. This is the human and Christian, in con- 
trast to the purely commercial and pagan, ethics of industry. 

So the unbroken tradition is handed down and 
the inviolate teaching of the Church still con- 



3IO DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

tinues from the Middle Ages, as it began with 
the preaching of Christ and the Sermon on the 
Mount. By this teaching can the evils of today 
be remedied as were the evils of yesterday. By 
its light shall we learn the proper limitation of 
interest on capital, and the fair remuneration of 
management and labor, together with the true 
spirit of cooperation, copartnership and Christian 
brotherhood. 



CHAPTER XXIX 

THE TRIUMPH OF WORKINGMEN'S 
COOPERATIVES 

THE basis of all true social reconstruction 
is the gild concept. The ideal social or- 
der will be that which most perfectly 
applies it. The medieval gilds continued in their 
usefulness for many centuries. There is no rea- 
son why a new gild development, as perfectly 
adapted to our own times, should not continue in 
existence for as many centuries to come, stabiliz- 
ing our economic conditions, ending class-conflict 
and securing social peace and welfare. Minor ad- 
justments can readily be made with changing cir- 
cumstances, as the old gildsmen constantly adapted 
their sane and approved principles, based on the 
Gospel and the natural law, to the newly arising 
needs of the day. 

Lest it be imagined that we are here dealing 
with empty illusions, it may be well to begin by 
showing how the gild idea is already practically 
and successfully applied in what may be called the 
merchant gilds of our day. Like the medieval 
English gilds of that name they are not the out- 
growth of high finance, but the achievements of 
simple workingmen. The economic gild idea, as 
conceived in its perfection, is a movement of the 

311 



JI2 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

workingmen, by the workingmen, for their own 
and the common good, understanding by " work- 
ingmen " all those who labor either with hand or 
brain, provided their purpose is not the amassing 
of their own individual profits. They must seek 
the common good no less than their own ad- 
vantage. 

It was in 1 844 that twenty-eight poor weavers 
organized in England a cooperative store, dealing 
in four commodities only, the Rochdale Equitable 
Pioneers Society. The movement prospered with 
never a failure or a single lean year. Within 
three quarters of a century it embraced one-third 
of the total population of Great Britain and an- 
nually distributed to its members commodities 
amounting in worth to $1,000,000,000. Its 
profits were then $100,000,000 a year, of which 
$65,000,000 were returned in dividends to the 
members, the remaining portion being used for in- 
terest on capital or for education, propaganda and 
welfare purposes. Dividends represented the 
worker's savings on his purchases which had been 
made at market prices. 

The full meaning of its " dividends M to the 
workingman will be made clear when it is stated 
in concrete terms that they ordinarily amounted 
to a sum large enough to pay the entire rent bill 
for the enrolled laborer and his family. Mem- 
bership, therefore, in a cooperative trading society 
was equivalent for him, to the free gift of a home. 



workingmen's cooperatives 313 

Surely no small consideration. The figures here 
quoted are offered on the authority of Mr. James 
P. Warbasse, President of the Cooperative League 
for America in 19 19, who thus describes the state 
of the Cooperative British Wholesale Society at 
the close of the war: 

The British Wholesale Society supplies 1,200 societies. It 
owns its own steamships. It has fourteen great warehouses. 
It gives lavishly of its great resources towards welfare work. 
It is the largest purchaser of Canadian wheat in the world. 
Its eight flour mills are the largest in Great Britain. These 
mills produce thirty-five tons of flour every hour for the people 
who own the mills. The cooperators of Glasgow own the 
largest bakery in the world. The British Cooperative Whole- 
sale Society owns sixty-five factories. Their soap works make 
500 tons of soap a week. They produce 5,000,000 pairs of 
boots annually. They conduct three great printing plants. 
Their 24,000 acres of farms in England produce vast quantities 
of dairy products, fruit and vegetables. They have recently 
purchased 100,000 acres of the best wheat lands in Canada. 
They own their own coal mines. They own 3,200 acres of tea 
plantations in Ceylon and vineyards in Spain. In Africa they 
control vast tracts of land for the production of olives, from 
which oil for their soap factories is produced. 1 

Rather a fair development from the modest be- 
ginnings made by the twenty-eight weavers with 
apparently no prospects in life but the poorhouse! 
It illustrates what can be accomplished by an or- 
ganization owned and controlled by workingmen. 

1 The Carpenter. It must be understood that the productive 
enterprises themselves, enumerated above, were not ordinarily 
conducted cooperatively. Thus the various factories were still 
usually operated on the wage-system. 



3 14 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

In a similar manner Danish farmers have shown 
their power of self control by binding themselves 
to buy or sell to their own cooperatives only for 
a definite number of years in order to overcome 
the competition of capitalist rivals who for the 
first year might offer their goods at a lower rate 
than the cooperative in order to withdraw the men 
from their own undertakings, and later raise the 
prices at their own pleasure. In the meantime 
the farmers could fairly judge whether their co- 
operative was sound and safe. 2 Hence the great 
success of the Danish cooperative movement. Co- 
operative trading has proved successful in small 
countries and large, in Finland and Russia. 

The question of cooperation has been suffi- 
ciently dealt with by the present writer in previous 
studies gathered together in " The World Prob- 
lem." It is further developed here to show the 
possibility of applying the gild idea on a scale com- 
mensurate with our modern civilization. From 
the above illustration we can perhaps surmise what 
may yet be accomplished in the more difficult field 
of cooperative production as well as in the highly 
successful trading and banking enterprises of the 
workingmen. The latter are an education for 
labor. This the Catholic Bishops of the United 
States pointed out in their u Social Reconstruc- 
tion, " January, 19 19, as also the American Fed- 
eration of Labor in its own u Reconstruction Pro- 

2 Central-Blatt and Social Justice, Nov., 1918, p. 239. 



workingmen's cooperatives 315 

gram." The following passages express the Fed- 
eration's hearty endorsement of consumers' co- 
operative societies : 

There is an almost limitless field for the consumers in which 
to establish cooperative buying and selling, and in this neces- 
sary development the trade unionists should take an immediate 
and active part. . . . Participation in these cooperative agencies 
must of necessity prepare the mass of the people to participate 
more effectively in the solution of the industrial, commercial, 
social and political problems which continually arise. 

With the American National Cooperative Con- 
vention, held at Springfield, 111., September, 191 8, 
the United States may be said to have definitely 
entered upon the new era of cooperation, as the 
last of the great world Powers to realize the im- 
portance of this movement. Best of all, it was 
a workingmen's convention, in which the speeches 
and discussions were by workingmen mainly. Its 
purpose was " the formation of a national coop- 
erative wholesale house as a medium of supply to 
upward of 1,000 retail cooperatives in the United 
States." By this wider cooperation the various 
stores hoped more effectively to overcome the com- 
petition of wholesalers and jobbers. The com- 
prehensive plans of the American workingmen 
were thus outlined at the time in the Catholic 
Charities Review: 

This will supply the special abilities of the best men of each 
group — men qualified for organizing being placed in one 
group, financial men in another, expert accountants in another, 
and shrewd buyers in others — who will give the seven groups 



316 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

concerned the immediate benefit of their collective experience. 
The organization will finally resemble that of labor unions, 
which are formed into State federations, with national and in- 
ternational bodies above them. Owned from below and man- 
aged democratically from below, the warehouses supervised by 
the national organization will ultimately be erected in every 
important center of the country. 3 

In these now historic events we behold a true 
gild idea applied and carried out, as it should be, 
on a broad democratic basis. Shares were usually 
placed at the reasonable valuation of from $5 to 
$25, within the easy reach of every workingman. 
The more a family buys the more is the money 
returned to it in " dividends, n but really as sav- 
ings. It is a movement away from Socialism and 
back to the gilds with their sound tenet of wide 
private ownership and management by the work- 
ers in place of ownership and management by a 
communistic state. It is our first gild lesson. 

The very beginnings of this movement remind us 
of the origin of the medieval craft gilds which in 
their early struggle effectively ended the capitalistic 
system of their day. It was the cradle exploit of 
a youthful Hercules whose labors were to be de- 
voted to the good of mankind. " The coopera- 
tive movement, as we know it to-day," wrote Lewis 
S. Gannett in the Survey, " began with more or less 
spontaneity among small groups of weavers, me- 
chanics, peasants, here and there, in Ireland, Rus- 
sia, Denmark, France, England and Germany — 

3 March, 1919, p. 82. 



workingmen's cooperatives 317 

almost everywhere except in America." 4 When 
it finally arose in America, it began in exactly the 
same manner. The Church at once welcomed this 
movement and took it into her arms. Her priests, 
like their predecessors a thousand years before, 
not merely encouraged it but gave to it their hearty 
support. Everywhere cooperative credit banks, in 
particular, were started for the rural populations 
by the parish priests. Even in distant India we 
find them successfully controlling or inspiring the 
cooperative trading and credit movement among 
the natives. A large and interesting volume could 
be written showing the active interest taken by 
the Catholic Church in the system of cooperation. 
It is not a revolutionary movement, in the So- 
cialist and Bolshevist sense, but a gradual and 
far more lasting transformation of society and of 
the entire economic order, without violence or in- 
justice, provided the common good and the Gos- 
pel teachings are not lost to sight. " While the 
Socialists have been talking State ownership, and 
then, once having control of the states, have be- 
come afraid of the thing they preached," says the 
w r riter just quoted, " the cooperatives have, rela- 
tively unnoticed, been building up a form of in- 
dustry which, more peacefully but no less cer- 
tainly, challenges the pre-war irresponsible capi- 
talist system of production." 5 To this system we 

4 " The Cooperative International/' April 5, 1919. 

5 Ibid. 



318 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

all are opposed and the Socialist vote has to a 
great extent implied no more than a protest against 
it. So far all can heartily agree. But men have 
failed to see the equally pernicious principles of 
the Socialist movement and the dangerous power 
given by it into the hands of men who are opposed 
alike to religion and to Christian morality, while 
their communistic dreams can only prove eco- 
nomically ruinous in the end. What men really 
desire is the solution offered by a Christian sys- 
tem of cooperation. Unfortunately cooperatives 
are constantly confused with Socialists by careless 
journalists, and even Bishop Ketteler and Pope 
Leo XIII, as well as the first Christians in the 
Apostolic Church, have been called Socialists. 
The word itself is perfectly innocent, and we might 
willingly claim it for ourselves, if its root-meaning 
were alone to be considered. But words often 
lose their primitive significance and gather about 
them a variety of associations in which they are 
clothed. Hence the wise insistence of Pope Pius 
X that the Christian popular movement be known 
as Christian Democracy and not as Social Democ- 
racy. There is an essential difference between 
the two. The former acknowledges all just rights 
of property, and seeks to bring about, not the 
abolition of private ownership in the means of 
production, but its widest distribution. The case 
has been clearly stated by a writer in the Irish 
Theological Quarterly. He asks : 



workingmen's cooperatives 319 

Ought we try to remedy our present system by gradually 
working back to the Middle-Age conception of industry, in which 
practically every worker would be capitalist and laborer at the 
same time? Or ought private ownership to be abolished entirely, 
and an experiment be made with collective ownership ? . . . The 
former alternative is favored not only by Catholics, who have 
definite ethical considerations to guide them, but also by a large 
body of non-Catholic social reformers. No one wants to re- 
vert to the industrial conditions of the Middle Ages. That 
would be obviously an absurd policy in view of the develop- 
ments of science and machinery. What is aimed at is to bring 
bur present industrial system into line with the more humane 
conception of industry, which obtained in those days. With this 
end in view social reformers have from time to time put forward 
various more or less tentative schemes, such as cooperation, co- 
partnership and profit-sharing. 

Cooperation would bind together in groups the small capi- 
talists, that is the men who are at once the owners and workers 
of their business, and would thereby give them the economic 
advantages enjoyed by the large unit of capital. The system 
has been adopted with great success in the case of agriculture, 
and the consumers' cooperative stores. Copartnership is meant 
to apply chiefly to great industrial concerns, in which the de- 
velopment of machinery and the specialization of functions have 
rendered it necessary for great numbers of workers to cooperate 
in the manufacture of specific articles. The idea is to give all 
such workers a share in the capital and profits of the concern, 
so that the worker will no longer be a mere wage-earner, but will 
have a personal interest in the success of the business. 

The second alternative, that of collective ownership, is pro- 
posed by Socialism and a number of other more or less extreme 
policies which have developed from Socialism. . . . The ideal 
of every collectivist policy is a social organization, in which there 
will be but one owner, the Community, and in which every cit- 
izen will be merely a wage-earner. The ideal of the Catholic 
social reformer on the other hand is an equitable distribution 
of wealth in a community in which every laborer will be owner, 
or at least part-owner of the business in which he works. 6 

6 W. Moran, April, 1919. 



320 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

The aim, then, of an ideal Christian gild system, 
applied to our modern economic developments, is 
to enable every man, so far as possible, to be an 
owner of productive property, not by a meaning- 
less collectivism under a Socialist bureaucracy, but 
by a strictly private ownership, such as every in- 
dividual gildsman enjoyed in the Middle Ages, 
and every apprentice and journeymen could rea- 
sonably hope to acquire in his own good time. In 
this way alone can society be stabilized and ren- 
dered immune from revolution and social unrest. 
Vastly significant is the fact that the only organ- 
izations that were able successfully to withstand 
all the forces of Bolshevism, were the Russian co- 
operative societies. They had been big enough to 
provision the great armies after the corrupt Czar- 
ist Government had ceased to function, says the 
New York Evening Post, and they were not to be 
shaken by even a Bolshevist revolution. So too 
the Weekly Freeman reports the remarks of the 
Rev. T. A. Finlay, S. J., at the annual meeting of 
the cooperative Irish Agricultural Organization 
Society: 

It was a remarkable thing that even in Russia, where revolu- 
tion seemed to have broken into the wildest orgies, the Coop- 
erative Society had held its own and seemed to be increasing 
daily in favor. Cooperative societies have been favored by 
all the Governments that had succeeded one another in that 
disturbed country. 

The gild idea reached its most perfect modern 



WORKINGMEN S COOPERATIVES 32 I 

expression, so far attained, in the cooperative pro- 
ductive societies. It shall be the purpose of an- 
other chapter to outline the future of society were 
this ideal still more fully and more adequately real- 
ized. 

Attention may here be called to the wide system 
of socialization, combined with private productive 
ownership, carried out by the farmers of North 
Dakota. Thus Bill No. 20 declared the purpose 
of the State of North Dakota to engage in the 
business of manufacturing and marketing farm 
products and to establish a warehouse, elevator 
and flour-mill system. To make State institutions 
independent of private capital, the State engaged 
in the banking business, without however closing 
the private banks. There was also a State hail- 
insurance department and a State home-building 
association established. All these laws were 
passed in January and February, 19 19. 

The principle itself of private productive owner- 
ship was not attacked, but the purpose rather was 
to safeguard it for the farmers by socializing cer- 
tain institutions where cooperation had been em- 
ployed in other countries. It all helps to make 
plain the trend of the times: collectivism or co- 
operation. We do not object to a limited State 
ownership, provided it does not exceed the de- 
mands of the public good; but we oppose the prin- 
ciples of Socialist collectivism and favor coopera- 
tion. 



CHAPTER XXX 

MODERN INDUSTRIAL DEMOCRACY 

A FEW years before the World War a 
strike was declared in one of the Italian 
glass-blowing industries. Unfortunately 
for the men, the employers' association had been 
most thoroughly organized, and the workers soon 
found themselves engaged in a losing fight. The 
funds from which to pay the strikers were rap- 
idly running low and defeat was staring them in 
the face. At this moment, as Mr. Andrew E. 
Malone describes the event in the Irish Monthly, 1 
a flanking movement was decided upon. Sufficient 
capital was collected by the workers and a coop- 
erative society was formed that now gave em- 
ployment to the men in their own plant. The ex- 
periment proved too successful to be discontinued 
with the termination of the strike. A period of 
sharp competition between the workmen's coop- 
erative and the employers' plants naturally fol- 
lowed. It was a severe test for the workers' en- 
durance and the financial soundness of their ven- 
ture. But every difficulty was overcome, and by 
the end of the war, one-half of the entire output 
of bottles in Italy was produced in the four large 

1 June, 1919. 

322 



MODERN INDUSTRIAL DEMOCRACY 323 

factories of the Federated Cooperative Glass- 
works, owned and managed by the workers. 

The success of the Bottleblowers' Union was a 
lesson not lost upon the workers in other indus- 
tries, and soon almost every department of pro- 
duction could number its enterprises coopera- 
tively conducted by the men engaged in them. 
The movement had proved the ability of the work- 
ers to manage their own industries in open com- 
petition with capitalistic factories and workshops. 

In the United States workmen's cooperative 
productive societies had sprung up periodically 
during almost the entire history of the labor move- 
ment. They were usually founded under condi- 
tions precisely similar to those under which the 
Italian union began its venture. A series of labor 
defeats was likely to be followed by a mushroom 
growth of cooperative productive societies, which 
either failed, or became capitalistic with success, 
or else disappeared so noiselessly that no further 
record can be found of them in contemporary doc- 
uments. Yet these desultory pre-war efforts were 
no test of what could be accomplished under more 
favorable circumstances. Cooperative production 
in industry was more successful in France and Eng- 
land during this same period, but the movement 
rather declined than increased in these countries 
before the war. The immense productive enter- 
prises of the great cooperative trading society of 
Great Britain were not necessarily cooperative, 



324 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

but were ordinarily conducted on a mere wage-sys- 
tem, with the cooperative society as the employer. 

A remarkable step was taken when in 19 19 
the trade union movement in Britain, with its 
5,000,000 members, decided to join forces with 
the Union of British Cooperative Societies, num- 
bering about 4,000,000 members, with the pur- 
pose of dominating production, consumption and 
distribution in Great Britain. Yet this too was 
not a society for cooperative production, but to 
control prices and guarantee a market for the co- 
operative organizations. The unions were to sup- 
ply capital for increased production on the part 
of the cooperative societies, while all their bank- 
ing business was to be undertaken by the Coop- 
erative Wholesale Bank. 

With the close of the World War the idea of 
cooperative production in industry had taken a 
new hold upon the mind and imagination of the 
workers of the entire world. Unfortunately the 
true historic lesson of the gild idea had not been 
brought home and communism and Socialism were 
widely confused with it. Hence the many aber- 
rations of the new movement. 

Long before this period Bishop Ketteler, in his 
plans for cooperative factories to be owned and 
managed by the workers, had made a modern 
Christian application of the medieval gilds to the 
large-scale machine production of our day. Nat- 
urally his ideals were never realized. The work- 



MODERN INDUSTRIAL DEMOCRACY 325 

ers of Germany were still financially and in many 
other ways too helpless to undertake this enter- 
prise on their own responsibility, and Bishop Ket- 
teler looked for the altruistic support of some 
of the great employers, who, he hoped, might be 
induced to give part of their accumulated fortunes 
to enable the workers to begin their cooperative 
ventures. The good Bishop was not the only 
one, as we know, vainly to entertain such hopes. 

Passing next over the many unsuccessful ef- 
forts of the Utopian Socialists, we find a new im- 
petus given to the gild idea in industry by M. 
Georges Sorel, the founder of the modern athe- 
istic syndicalism, which began in the French non- 
Catholic syndicats, became the doctrine of the di- 
rect-actionists in England, and was copied by the 
I. W. W., or Industrial Workers of the World, 
in America. Direct action (i.e., action without 
reliance upon political means), violence, sabotage, 
and the general strike u with folded arms," soon 
became inseparably connected with the word 
" Syndicalism." 

This, however, was merely its destructive as- 
pect. Constructively, syndicalism proposed to ac- 
quire for the workers the factories in which they 
were engaged, without any compensation to the 
owners. Since the idea of authority, both human 
and Divine, was scornfully rejected by its follow- 
ers, any means that could bring about this con- 
summation were held to be justifiable. While, 



326 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

therefore, the medieval gild idea was in a measure 
caught by them in the ownership and manage- 
ment of industries by the workers, the means by 
which this was to be brought about and the meth- 
ods by which it was to be carried out were dis- 
tinctly false, morally unjustifiable and economi- 
cally ruinous. 

What has been said of syndicalism can be re- 
peated, in its own way, of the Soviets, as intro- 
duced by the Bolshevist Socialists of Russia. 
They shared in the worst vices of the proposed 
atheistical syndicats. They were equally regard- 
less of the rights of property and the claims of 
authority, human and Divine. And yet they con- 
tained the germs of the gild idea, but without be- 
lief in God and obedience to His Ten Command- 
ments and to the voice of His Church. Here pre- 
cisely is the essential difference, the difference that 
implies failure on the one side and success on the 
other. The just rights of property were never dis- 
regarded by the gilds, as supported by the Church, 
nor were the interests of the various classes neg- 
lected. A classless society was never a gild ideal, 
but rather a society in which the laborer could 
achieve economic independence, could hope by in- 
dustry and virtue to own his means of produc- 
tion and might joyfully perform his daily task 
without envy of other classes, who were made to 
respect his just rights as he religiously respected 
theirs. To paraphrase a line long consecrated to 



MODERN INDUSTRIAL DEMOCRACY 327 

the efforts of schoolboy oratory : " To be a gilds- 
man was to be a king." But of this position the 
laborer was first to render himself worthy by train- 
ing, experience and the record of a true religious 
life. Here is the great weakness of modern in- 
dustrial democracy. It is a sad mistake to im- 
agine that it can succeed without God or that men 
can be fit for responsibility without previous train- 
ing and trial. Such were many of the immature 
attempts that led to failure. 

Gild Socialism is another, and more direct mod- 
ern application of the medieval gild conception. 
The mistake made here consists in yoking to- 
gether two irreconcilable ideas that mutually con- 
tradict each other. The essence of the gild con- 
cept is private ownership attainable by the work- 
ers who prove their fitness. The essence of So- 
cialism is, on the contrary, the denial of private 
ownership by the workers. A common form of 
Gild Socialism is that which would vest the own- 
ership of the various industries in the State and 
give their management into the hands of the re- 
spective workers. Yet this idea, combining State 
ownership with labor control, if justly applied and 
limited to certain industries, is not of itself more 
objectionable than other forms of public owner- 
ship that are licit if the public interest demands 
them. The danger of abuse is obvious. 

The originality of the Plumb plan, designed by 
Glen E. Plumb for the railroad brotherhoods, 



328 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

was to be found in its directorate, which distin- 
guished it from all other forms of Gild Socialism. 
While the latter commonly vests the ownership 
with the public and leaves the control and man- 
agement to the workers, the new device admitted 
/ the public as one of three controlling factors. 
The board of directors was to consist of fifteen 
persons, five of whom were to be appointed by the 
President to represent the people, five to be elected 
by the operating officials and five to be chosen by 
the other employees. Rates were to be fixed, as 
before, by the Interstate Commerce Commission, 
but the determining of wages were ultimately to 
rest with the operating officials and employees, in 
as far as they constituted two-thirds of the direc- 
torate. 

The surplus left after the payment of all ex- 
penses and charges was to be divided equally be- 
tween the Government and the employees. But 
should the share accruing to the former ever ex- 
ceed five per cent on the gross operating revenue, 
the entire government dividend was to be ab- 
sorbed in a reduction of rates. Thus it was 
hoped gradually to reduce both traveling and 
freight charges for the public. 

To prevent the employees from voting them- 
selves higher wages whenever the government 
dividends would exceed five per cent, so that the 
wages might continually increase and the rates 
never fall, it was determined to give the operat- 



MODERN INDUSTRIAL DEMOCRACY 329 

ing officials twice the dividend paid to the other 
employees. An increase in dividends, it was held, 
would thus be preferable for them to an increase 
of salary. It is obvious how delicately adjusted 
the new mechanism was and how readily it might 
be thrown into disorder. The remaining sections 
of the plan dealt with the building of extensions 
and the establishment of a sinking fund, the money 
of which was eventually to be used to retire bonds 
now privately held, so that the roads might become 
the property of the people. 

The ethical aspects of this plan are as compli- 
cated as its mechanism. If the property is owned 
by the people, we naturally ask, why should half 
the dividends be given to the workers who do 
not own it? Yet, on the other hand, it is not 
improper that labor be permitted a share in divi- 
dends to encourage production. But if the peo- 
ple are the employers of the railroad brother- 
hoods, why should the employees alone, in prac- 
tice, determine the wages in which the people are 
equally interested? Why should not both have 
at least an equal vote? The common good 
should here be a main consideration. This again 
is a principle of true democracy. The workers 
themselves must always be the first to demand 
that the rights of the people are scrupulously re- 
spected. The application of such plans to all in- 
dustry would destroy private ownership. 

The true gild idea demands the persistence of 



330 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

private productive property, but would have both 
its ownership and management vested, so far as 
may be justly and reasonably possible, in the 
workers themselves. This idea is to be carried 
out neither by violence, sabotage and general 
strikes, nor yet by confiscation, whether direct or 
in the form of taxation. It can be realized, in 
the first place, by the competitive efforts of the 
workers themselves, as has been shown in the 
case of the Italian Bottleblowers' Union, and 
might be illustrated by countless similar instances. 
Writing in the American Journal of Sociology, 
Victor S. Yarros says : 

It is our duty and our privilege to promote industrial democ- 
racy in all proper, expedient ways. Trade unions should turn 
their thoughts to the question of cooperative production and 
cooperative distribution. They are demanding justice, but they 
are not doing all they can to advance and establish industrial 
justice. They think too much of immediate questions and not 
enough about the future of industry and labor. Why should 
not American trade unions, or industrial unions, assume en- 
trepreneur functions? Why should they not compete with pri- 
vate contractors? Why should they not start, on a modest 
scale, cooperative factories? One such factory, if successful, 
would be worth a thousand strikes from the point of view of 
ultimate economic justice and order. In primitive Russia there 
are thousands of Artiels, cooperative organizations of peasants 
and laborers. If American labor wants democratic industry, 
it should proceed to give society object lessons in democratic or 
cooperative industry. We may be sure that before long it will 
do this instead of contenting itself with negative methods. In 
the Old World cooperation has grown steadily and has been 
iuccessful in many ways. 2 

2 " The Coming Industrial Democracy," May, 1919. 



MODERN INDUSTRIAL DEMOCRACY 33 I 

But it is not necessary that cooperative enter- 
prises should be undertaken by the workers ex- 
clusively. Hence the value of copartnership, de- 
fined as : u A system of industry under which 
the great mass of workers will not only have a 
direct interest in the profit of their work, but be 
part owners of the capital with which it is carried 
on." 3 Copartnership of necessity includes profit- 
sharing, but profit-sharing by itself alone is not 
copartnership. It is " an agreement, freely en- 
tered into, by which the employee receives a share, 
fixed in advance, of the profits. " 4 Copartnership 
may often be the most feasible method of coop- 
eration where larger sums of capital are required 
than the workingmen themselves can furnish from 
their own resources. It therefore invites outside 
shareholders to provide a portion, greater or 
smaller, of the capital needed. Labor then shares, 
according to its own contribution, both in the 
profits and the control of the business. This plan 
was evolved by workingmen themselves in Eng- 
land and was put into successful operation on the 
initiative of employers as well as of labor. 

In the typical English labor copartnership so- 
ciety, as described by Aneurin Williams in 19 13, 
each shareholder was given a single vote, irrespec- 
tive of his or her amount of share capital. The 

3 Aneurin Williams, " Co-partnership and Pofit-Sharing," p. 
10. 

4 Ibid., p. 13. 



332 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

latter might never exceed £200 for any one in- 
dividual. The committee on management was 
democratically elected by the shareholders, and 
every class of the membership was to be repre- 
sented, including the customers, who were the co- 
operative societies and as such held shares. The 
division of profits, after wages and expenses have 
been paid, is thus explained: 

The first charge upon the net profit, after providing for de- 
preciation, reserve, etc., is usually a dividend of five per cent 
on the shares. The profit remaining after that is divided as a 
dividend to the workers on wages, a dividend to the customers 
on the amount of their purchases, a small additional dividend 
on shares, certain payments to educational and provident funds, 
and so on. Thus shares may in a prosperous society get a 
total return of six or even seven per cent, labor a dividend of 
is. or is. 6d. (in pre-war values) on wages, and customers a 
rebate of perhaps %d. in the pound on their purchases. The 
figures, of course, vary greatly. In all the more modern soci- 
eties the worker cannot withdraw his dividend on wages in 
cash, until he has accumulated a certain sum in the shares of 
the society. Up to that sum it is capitalized. 5 

Employers themselves have often taken a lead- 
ing part in the development of copartnership as 
well as of profit-sharing schemes. Among the 
first notable methods for the partitioning of divi- 
dends between capital and labor in the United 
States, was the so-called Ryan-Callahan plan of 
11 distributive justice." The following is a de- 
scription of it as it was operative in 19 17, when a 

6 Ibid., p. 56. 



MODERN INDUSTRIAL DEMOCRACY 333 

bonus equal to fifty-six per cent on their wages fell 
to the share of the employees: 

First, the entire profits of the business for the year are reck- 
oned, lump sum. Then, they are cut into two equal parts. One 
part goes to capital, the other to labor. The share to capital is 
distributed in proportion to the capital actually invested, paper 
stock not being considered. Capital gets no other share in the 
profits of the business. Thus capital and labor share equally 
in all profits, on the principle that they are equally indis- 
pensable factors of production. Labor's share is distributed in 
this way: As the Callahan plant is a manufacturing concern, 
there are three distinct classes of workers employed, each alike 
indispensable, namely, factory employees, salesmen, and office 
force. Each of these classes gets one-third of labor's share and 
each member of a class receives the proportion that his wage or 
salary bears to that third. This completes the plan. 

As an educational feature, the dividends were 
placed at a good rate of interest for the workers. 
The capital thus formed was paid out to them 
only in case they desired it for the building of a 
home or some similar worthy purpose, or if they 
left their employment. This course was followed 
in as far as the dividends given out the first year 
in a lump sum had quickly disappeared, without 
improving the condition of the workers. 

Even where capital is less willing to make con- 
cessions it recognizes the falsity of the assump- 
tion that what is of advantage to the laborer must 
be of advantage to the employer. The reply 
given by Robert Owen to the factory owner who 
said to him, " If my men liked, they could save 
me £10,000 a year by better work and the avoid- 



334 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

ance of waste," has become classical: u Then 
why don't you pay them £5,000 a year to do it? " 
As John Leitch has expressed the same idea: 
" Old-fashioned owners expect people to work for 
them. Working for spells competition; working 
with is cooperation." To bring men to work with 
him is the problem to be solved by the modern 
business man. 

The following is a characteristic type of the 
copartnership plan as introduced in England by 
many of the employers themselves during the pre- 
war period. 

Every regular worker has a share of profit credited to him 
in proportion to the economy of production, and to the amount 
of his wages. By the accumulation and investment of this 
profit he becomes a shareholder, and, at the shareholders' meet- 
ings, he has a vote in proportion to his capital; and he helps 
to elect the Directors. Thus copartnership gives the share in 
responsibility and control which normally goes with sharehold- 
ing. I do not mean by that a right to interfere in the details 
of the management, any more than an ordinary stockholder has 
a right to do so in a joint stock company. I mean a voice in 
settling the general policy of the business, and in electing the 
Directors who are to carry out that policy. 

But an even broader vision was given by the 
Great War, and employers were in many instances 
of their own accord prepared to welcome the par- 
ticipation of labor also " in the details of the man- 
agement " on its industrial side. So the world 
was daily progressing towards new concepts of a 
new order of democratic industry. A first step 
towards this was the shop-committee system. 



MODERN INDUSTRIAL DEMOCRACY 335 

In " Man to Man " John Leitch outlines a plan 
modeled by him after the Government of the 
United States. It consists of a House of Rep- 
resentatives, elected by the employees; a Senate 
constituted of foremen and department managers; 
and a Cabinet, or executive council, with the pres- 
ident of the company as the president of the cab- 
inet. In this the discussions of the two Houses 
are taken up and with it the ultimate approval of 
all measures pertaining to the conduct of the fac- 
tory must therefore rest after having passed the 
House and Senate. The complaints and griev- 
ances of the men, their disputes over rates or 
wages are to be presented to their representatives 
in the House, there to be fairly discussed and de- 
cided at the meeting. These representatives are 
to be elected by departments, one for each twenty- 
five employees. Small departments combine with 
each other. Such at least was the first practical 
application made. The following illustration of 
this plan, as it was operative during the years 
19 1 8 and 19 19 in the Demuth Company, the larg- 
est manufacturers of pipes and smokers' articles 
in the world, will be of interest: 

In the Demuth plan the employee's profit from the plan is 
dependent upon his effective interest in it and in the prosperity 
of the plant, not upon his " bargaining power." His dividends, 
which are distinct from his wages, increase and decrease with 
the quantity and quality of output, individual and group effi- 
ciency, and market conditions. In this plant, therefore, the em- 



336 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

ployee's representatives have not approached the question of 
hours dogmatically, but have experimented with various work- 
ing schedules and adjusted them to output and market condi- 
tions, with a view to the greatest profit to the company as a 
whole. In a similar scientific spirit they keep a close eye on 
labor turnover, have made a plant schedule of holidays for a 
great variety of races, and have set up their own Americaniza- 
tion classes. The plan was not introduced because of labor 
troubles, and there have never been any at this plant. 6 

Yet in spite of this roseate picture a combined 
strike and lock-out resulted a few months after 
these lines were written. For two reasons the 
American Federation of Labor objected to all 
such plans of " Industrial Democracy/' however 
benevolently intended and conducted. The first 
was that they still leave the final decision with the 
employer; and the second, that they overlook the 
labor unions and substitute an employer's organi- 
zation in their stead. These are sound objec- 
tions. There can be no doubt that labor must 
ultimately find its safety in its own organization, 
since it cannot make itself dependent upon the 
mere benevolence of employers. 

The main problem for labor unions is to keep 
just and reasonable in their demands. It will 
thus be possible, through them, to cooperate 
towards industrial democracy along the lines of 
the already existing order. The initiative to many 
such movements in the United States was given 

6 The Review, June 21, 19 19. 



MODERN INDUSTRIAL DEMOCRACY 337 

by the War Labor Board whose general princi- 
ples in the shops conducted by it were : 

That men and management should together and by common 
consent work out a shop-committee system; that this system 
should be adapted to the peculiar local needs of the factory or 
plant; that due proportional representation should be given to 
every group which, upon investigation, appears to be entitled 
to it. 7 

In the same way the Whitley Report, adopted 
by the British Government, sought to apply the 
principle of representative government to the 
whole field of industry, calling for joint industrial 
councils, national, district and " works," in which 
labor and capital were to be equally represented, 
while the presidency of the various councils was 
to be assigned to impartial officers. It is to be 
observed also that both workers and employers 
are represented by their unions or associations. 
Even copartnership plans themselves cannot dis- 
pense with the need of the trade unions, since the 
danger will always remain that wages may be re- 
duced in favor of dividends. Thus the Labor 
Co-Partnership Association of London, after the 
great railway strike of September, 191 1, wisely 
issued the following pronouncement: 

Copartnership assumes a standard wage before there can be 
any talk of profit to divide. A standard wage assumes organ- 
ization to maintain it and to raise it. It assumes reasonable 
forms of trade unionism, collective bargaining, the meeting of 
capital and labor. 8 

7 The Survey, June 7, 1919. 
•Williams, op. cit., p. 207. 



33 8 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

The democratization of industry does not im- 
ply the disappearance of all previous economic 
institutions. Cooperative and copartnership ar- 
rangements, public ownership, individually con- 
ducted enterprises and private corporations will 
continue side by side, as shall be demanded for 
the common good. But labor's increasing share 
in ownership and responsibility will be the surest 
safeguard of lasting industrial peace. On the 
other hand the legal restrictions placed upon the 
acquisition of excessive fortunes through just 
methods of graded taxation, whose purpose is not 
confiscation, but the public good, will greatly re- 
duce the former inequalities, and the envy and 
discontent to which they gave birth. Bidding 
us look with him into the future a recent writer 
asks: 

Does it please you to contemplate a future in which one boy 
or girl out of ten may " rise " to a condition of independence 
and dignity, while the other nine must remain dependent for their 
living upon the hiring and firing process, with no interest in 
the work by which they live except such as can be enclosed in 
the pay-envelope? Or would you rather contemplate a future 
in which the range of jobs that have been emancipated from 
the status of wage-slavery [i. e., the exclusive dependence upon 
wages and denial of all partnership in responsibility] is coex- 
tensive with the field of industry? That is the issue reduced to 
its essentials. 

Finally it is necessary that the burden of eco- 

9 The New Republic, June 7, 1919. 



MODERN INDUSTRIAL DEMOCRACY 339 

nomic betterment of the worker, where this is rea- 
sonably called for, or the just taxation of incomes, 
be not placed upon the consumer, so that every 
increase in wages or taxation may not be accom- 
panied by a rise in prices. This can be brought 
about, on the one hand, by the various methods 
which enable the worker to share in the profit 
and responsibility of the business and hence in- 
crease his productivity, and on the other by keep- 
ing profits and taxation within reasonable limits. 
The worker, too, must act upon conscientious mo- 
tives, be satisfied with wages that the industry can 
bear without burdening the consumer, and give 
his fair energies through a period of time that is 
not abnormally shortened. These are principles 
the gildsmen held sacred, and that must be revived 
again in modern industry, if it is ever to be truly 
democratized. The home, too, must be kept in- 
violate, as well as the mother's place in it with her 
little ones. This will reduce the problem of un- 
employment, and make possible adequate wages, 
based on increased productivity, such as should 
certainly result from real industrial cooperation. 

The large corporations themselves were in a 
manner democratized long ago by the thousands, 
and even tens of thousands, of small investors who 
brought together into them their joint savings. 
But their management did not so readily change 
its autocratic nature. The small shareholder was 
to be satisfied with his dividend check and blindly 



340 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

vote " proxies." To protect him, therefore, from 
gambling, frenzied finance and outright spoliation, 
as Victor S. Yarros suggests, " publicity, demo- 
cratic control, directorates of a new type, will be 
found increasingly necessary." If the small in- 
vestor can not protect himself, the State must do 
so; for as the writer correctly says, the only mean 
between reactionary Bourbonism and Bolshevism 
is democratic industry. The Church had discov- 
ered this centuries ago and consistently acted 
upon it. 

The emphasis throughout this chapter has been 
placed upon self-help. It is the Socialistic fallacy 
to depend entirely upon the State, by surrender- 
ing land and industry to it, and thus establishing a 
new and worse autocracy in place of the old. It 
is on the other hand the mistake of many more 
judicious minds, who rightly look instead for a 
wider distribution of productive property among 
the workers themselves, to seek to attain this end 
by legislative measures almost exclusively. The 
lesson of the gilds can here again be of service. 
They accomplished their success through perfect 
cooperation with the municipal or State govern- 
ment, seeking first and foremost the common good. 

It is well that there should be State regulation 
protecting the small investor and discriminating in 
his favor, within all just limits. It is well that 
the burden of taxation should bear increasingly 
upon those who accumulate shares in their own in- 



MODERN INDUSTRIAL DEMOCRACY 34 1 

dividual hands, whether from one or from many 
corporations. It is well that there should be thus 
created the widest just distribution of voting stock 
among the people. It is well, too, that the manip- 
ulations of speculators should forever be made 
impossible by a relentless publicity and by ade- 
quate legal action. But the first step towards a 
true democratic industry is self-help on the part 
of labor and of the many sincere employers who 
are eager to promote the new democratic indus- 
try that alone can give social stability — provided 
always that the principles of the Church are not 
forgotten, on which every sound social order must 
be based. 



A CATHOLIC SOCIAL PLATFORM 



A CATHOLIC SOCIAL PLATFORM 

PREAMBLE 

i. True modern democracy first arose beneath 
the fostering care of the Church, derived its prin- 
ciples from the great Catholic thinkers of the Mid- 
dle Ages, found its expression in many of the 
early Catholic city-democracies, was actively main- 
tained in its rights of self-government during the 
wars of the twelfth century by Pope Alexander 
III, has been continuously exemplified since the 
thirteenth century in the Catholic cantons of Swit- 
zerland, and was most brilliantly defended in the 
theological schools of the seventeenth century. 
The Reformation doctrine of the Divine right of 
kings was ever strenuously opposed by the Church. 
(D./., XXVI.) 1 

2. All true democracy, as an embodiment of the 
brotherhood of man, must be based on the funda- 
mental doctrine of the Fatherhood of God. (D. 

I, v.) 

3. Its aim is not the abolition of classes, from 

1 At the end of the various clauses, " W. P." stands for " The 
World Problem " (P. J. Kenedy & Sons, New York, and R. & 
T. Washbourne, London), while the numerals following indicate 
the respective chapters. " D. I" similarly refers to " Democratic 
Industry" (same publishers). 

345 



346 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

which universal happiness is vainly expected by 
some to flow. It freely acknowledges " the di- 
versity of gifts that man receives, with the conse- 
quent inevitable difference in position, learning, 
acquirements and possessions which have ever 
characterized, and must always characterize the 
members of the human race." (Cardinal 
Bourne.) 

4. The perfect social ideal is found only in the 
Christian cooperation of all classes and of all in- 
dividuals, as members of one social body, under 
the governance of lawfully appointed authority, 
whose power, however conferred by the people, 
is ultimately derived from God. (W. P., XXV.) 

5. Democracy in education took its beginning in 
the great system of public schools created by the 
Church (Third and Fourth Lateran Councils, 
1 1 79 and 12 15) and in the vast medieval univer- 
sities fostered by her, with their gilds of masters 
and scholars. (D. I., XXIII.) 

6. With the " Great Pillage/' the suppression 
of monasteries and the confiscation of gild funds 
devoted to religion and charity, pauperism arose 
for the first time. The one power that by its very 
teaching and influence, as exemplified in the gilds 
at their perfection, could have preserved the work- 
ing classes from the degradation to which they 
were subjected, was set aside. Hence the u ra- 
pacious usury M that followed, so that, as Pope 
Leo XIII described the conditions existing in his 



A CATHOLIC SOCIAL PLATFORM 347 

own day: "A small number of very rich men 
have been able to lay upon the teeming masses 
of the laboring poor a yoke little better than slav- 
ery itself." (R. N. 2 ) (D. I., XXVII.) 

7. The chief aim of Christian social endeavor, 
or " Christian Democracy," is, in the words of the 
same Pontiff: " To make the condition of those 
who toil more tolerable; to enable them to ob- 
tain, little by little, those means by which they 
may provide for the future ; to help them to prac- 
tice in public and in private the duties which mo- 
rality and religion inculcate; to aid them to feel 
that they are not animals but men, not heathens 
but Christians, and so to enable them to strive 
more zealously and eagerly for the one thing 
which is necessary: the ultimate good for which we 
are all born into this world." (R. N.) What 
doth it profit a man if he gain the whole world and 
suffer the loss of his own soul. (Matt, xvi: 26.) 
(W. P., XXV; D. I., XXVIII.) 

FALSE SOCIAL SYSTEMS 

8. Socialism is no solution for the evils which 
have followed the Reformation. Far from satis- 
fying the legitimate desire of the worker for a 
personal share in productive ownership, it would 
ultimately deprive all alike of such ownership, sub- 
jecting the laborer hopelessly to a bureaucratic 

2 "Rerum No<varum/ t the Encyclical of Pope Leo XIII, "On 
the Condition of the Working Classes," issued in 1891. 



348 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

control, both tyrannical and inefficient. Social- 
ism is more or less complete in proportion as it 
aims at this abolition of private productive own- 
ership. {W.P., III; D.I., IV.) 

9. Individualistic capitalism, understood as a 
system in which the means of production are in the 
hands of a few men of wealth, inspired merely 
with a passion for the utmost gain and unre- 
strained by due legal restrictions, is equally per- 
nicious. (/F.P., IV, XXI.) 

CHRISTIAN DEMOCRACY 

10. The Church of Christ has not been founded 
to teach any particular system of sociology or eco- 
nomics. She condemns whatever is morally false 
in the existing practices or theories and commends 
whatever form of social order, based upon the nat- 
ural law and the Gospel, wisely answers the needs 
of any given period. She is not for any single 
generation but for all time, while economic condi- 
tions are fluctuating perpetually. {W . P., XVII; 
D. /., V-VIII, etc.) 

1 1. Yet it is the duty of Christians, particularly 
at the present moment, not to overlook the social 
dangers that imperil civilization; and it is possible 
for them to build up on her principles, teachings 
and traditions a true system of democratic indus- 
try which shall answer all the needs of their day. 
On no other foundation can a sound social order 
be erected. 



A CATHOLIC SOCIAL PLATFORM 349 

12. Equally opposed to the unnatural abolition 
of private productive ownership under Socialism, 
and to its restriction to a few men of wealth under 
capitalism, the true social system advocates instead 
the widest diffusion of the possession of productive 
as well as of private property, that as many as 
possible of the workers can hope, by just means, 
to become sharers in it. And this personally, and 
not merely in the name of a communistic common- 
wealth. (W. P., XVIII; D. /., I, XIX, etc.) 

13. Such possession will satisfy the aspirations 
of men, lift them above the position of wage-earn- 
ers only, and help to their full and harmonious de- 
velopment, insuring the stability of the new social 
order. (D. /., XXIX, XXX.) 

14. Such was the consummation most closely 
attained when Catholic gildhood was in its prime 
and the influence of the Church effective; when 
the apprentice might hope, by industry, skill and 
virtue, to become a master; when social discon- 
tent was unknown and pauperism undreamed of; 
when each lived for all and all for each. Such 
is the Catholic ideal. (D. /., XVIII-XXII, 
XXV.) 

DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

15. The old organizations cannot be restored as 
they were. But it is possible, in the words of 
Pius X: " To adapt them to the new situation 
created by the material evolution of contemporary 



350 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

society in the same Christian spirit which of old 
inspired them." (D. /., XXVIII.) 

1 6. Such, in a material way, are the cooperative 
trade, credit and agricultural societies intended for 
self-help and to eliminate a wasteful system of dis- 
tribution. Such are the attempts at cooperative 
production, where the entire enterprise is owned 
by the workers who alone receive both wage and 
profit, and where each worker is personal owner 
of shares and participates, directly or indirectly, 
in the management. {W. P., XIX, XX; D. I., 
XXIX, XXX.) 

17. Such, too, though less completely, are the 
various plans in which the workers own a consid- 
erable part of the voting stock. And such in fine, 
to a greater or less degree, are all copartnership 
arrangements by which the workers share in the 
corporate stock and reasonably participate in the 
industrial management: the regulation, through 
their shop gilds, of hours, wages, discipline, proc- 
esses of production, etc. (W . P., XIX; D. L, 
XVIII.) 

1 8. Since every business is constituted of money- 
capital and labor-capital, it is unreasonable that 
the former alone, as under capitalism, should have 
the entire power of control and the latter be sub- 
jected to a state of complete dependence. Men 
are more than money, and persons more precious 
than machinery. (Z). /., XVIII, etc.) 

19. But for the lasting success of any economic 



A CATHOLIC SOCIAL PLATFORM 35 1 

plans, religion is essential. The gilds were able to 
maintain their spirit of democratic industry in pro- 
portion only to their religious zeal. With this 
they waxed or waned. Without certain disaster, 
religion can never be dissociated from economics. 
(D.I., XIV, XXVII.) 

THE PUBLIC GOOD 

20. While keeping clearly in sight this vision of 
the true city, which is to be constructed after no 
merely speculative model, we must not forget the 
intermediate measures that are not, however, to be 
confounded with the ultimate goal. 

21. Adequate government regulation should 
prevent the accumulation of excessive gains in the 
hands of a few, the monopolistic control of com- 
modities, and the abuses that may arise in such 
public service monopolies as are under private op- 
eration. (D.I., XII.) 

22. Monopolies or combines are guilty of injus- 
tice when in the articles of common use they ex- 
ceed the highest prices, that would obtain in the 
market were it freely open to competition, presum- 
ing in each instance the previous payment of a just 
wage. They may offend against charity by not 
lowering this price as well when notable hardship 
is inflicted upon the poor. All " cornering " must 
be prevented absolutely and all unfair business 
methods. {W. P., V, VI.) 

23. State ownership should not be introduced 



352 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

where State control suffices. The farther an in- 
dustry is removed from a public service utility or 
a natural monopoly, the greater the presumption 
in favor of private ownership, cooperative or oth- 
erwise. (W. P., XVIII.) 

24. Since it is the duty of the State to see that 
natural resources are turned to good account for 
the support and welfare of all the people, " the 
State or municipality should acquire, always for 
compensation, those agencies of production, and 
those agencies only, in which the public interest 
demands that public property rather than private 
ownership should exist." (Irish Bishops, 19 14.) 
{JV. P., Ill, XXI.) 

25. Unjust restrictions should not be placed on 
those, who to the general benefit are acquiring 
legitimate prosperity -under private enterprise. 
{IV. P., XVIII.) 

26. Taxation should bear most upon those who 
are able to contribute most to the common good, 
but should not be made a means of confiscation. 
Special protection should be given to the small 
share-holder and a wider diffusion of shares made 
possible, within the limits of justice. The words 
of Pope Leo XIII must be borne in mind: " The 
right to possess private property is derived from 
nature, not from man; and the State has the right 
to control its use in the interest of the public good, 
but by no means to absorb it altogether. The 
State would therefore be unjust and cruel if under 



A CATHOLIC SOCIAL PLATFORM 353 

the name of taxation it were to deprive the private 
owner of more than is fitting." (R. N.) (W . 
P., XXI.) 

LABOR MEASURES 

27. Until a larger social justice reigns, mini- 
mum wage laws must enable every male worker 
to support a family in Christian decency. Every 
adult woman worker must be enabled to live re- 
spectably by her earnings alone. Enough should 
gradually be paid to make it possible for every 
worker to provide for the future out of his or her 
own wages, without need of State insurance. In 
this way only can industry be said to be properly 
supporting those engaged in it. (W. P., IX.) 

28. As exceptional business enterprise and effi- 
ciency, directed towards the greater common good, 
is entitled to an exceptional reward, so labor also 
should be remunerated in proportion to its con- 
tribution to industry. 

29. By workers we understand all engaged in 
mental as well as in manual occupations, in the 
service of distribution or production, from man- 
ager to messenger, although the need of State pro- 
tection for the former may be insignificant. 

30. As the State must come to the aid of the 
consumer in as far as the general welfare requires, 
so too it must safeguard labor's rights: religious, 
moral, physical and economic. In like manner 
the rights of every class must be duly protected 



354 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

by it to whatever extent the common good de- 
mands. {W. P., VIII.) 

31. The duty of labor is to give a fair day's 
work, as the duty of the employer is to provide 
a fair wage and proper working conditions, from 
a religious and moral, as well as from a material 
and sanitary point of view. {W . P., X.) 

32. Strikes are permitted for a grave and just 
cause, when there is a hope of success and no other 
satisfactory solution can be found, when justice 
and charity are preserved, and the rights of the 
public duly respected. Conciliation, arbitration 
and trade agreements are the natural means to be 
suggested in their stead. Hence the utility of 
public boards for this purpose. As in the strike, 
so in the lock-out, a serious and just cause is re- 
quired, and the rights of the workers and of the 
public must be respected. Charity is far more 
readily violated in the lock-out than in the strike, 
because of the greater suffering likely to be in- 
flicted on the laborer deprived of his work than 
on the employer. (W . P., XI.) 

33. Justification of the sympathetic strike will 
rarely be found, while the presumption is over- 
whelmingly against the general sympathetic strike. 
(fV. P., XII.) Blacklists on the part of em- 
ployers that permanently exclude from his trade 
a worker displeasing to them, who honestly seeks 
employment, are opposed to the first principles of 
justice. 



A CATHOLIC SOCIAL PLATFORM 355 

34. The problem of unemployment should be 
met by a permanent national employment service, 
acting with the cooperation of municipal and pri- 
vate bureaus. Methods of preventing or meeting 
the crisis of unemployment should be carefully 
studied. Governments have a serious duty to ob- 
viate this evil, and provide for the unemployed 
according to their necessity. {W. P. } XIII, 
XIV.) 

35. Hours of labor should be neither unrea- 
sonably long nor unreasonably short. Sunday la- 
bor should be prohibited, except in cases of real 
necessity, such as is too often merely presumed to 
exist. {JV. P., VIII; D. /., XIX, XX.) 

36. Until labor can properly provide for itself, 
the State should interest itself in housing condi- 
tions, particularly where there is danger to mor- 
als and religion as well as to the physical well- 
being of the worker and of his family. Health 
inspection in the schools and municipal clinics 
for the poor are recommended. (W. P., 

id 

37. Vocational training is desirable, without 
neglecting the cultural and religious education of 
our children. " A healthy democracy cannot tol- 
erate a purely industrial or trade education for any 
class of its citizens." Further, " the opportunities 
of the system should be extended to all qualified 
private schools on exactly the same basis as to the 
public schools. We want neither class divisions 



356 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

in education nor a State monopoly of education." 
(American Bishops.) (D. I. f XXL) 

38. So long as proper wages are not accorded, 
social insurance is to be favored to whatever ex- 
tent may be necessary to safeguard the laborer 
in sickness, accident, invalidity and old age. It 
must be clearly understood, however, that there is 
question of a temporary substitute only for an ade- 
quate wage, which will enable the worker to carry 
his own insurance and not to be a mere ward of the 
State. The dignity of labor must be protected 
from communistic paternalism as well as from cap- 
italistic abuses. {W. P., XVII; D. /., IV.) 

39. An intelligent penal system will make it 
possible for dependents to live upon the earnings 
of the imprisoned wage-earner. It may also en- 
able the prisoner to lay aside something for future 
rehabilitation. (W. P., XVII. ), 

40. The right of labor organization is no 
longer in question and never should have been. 
The worker should see that Christian principles 
are maintained within his union and not permit it, 
through his own carelessness, to be made the 
helpless tool of extremists. {IV. P., XVI; D. I., 

in.) 

41. It is therefore of the highest importance 
that Christian social education through organiza- 
tion and literature, be extended to every single one 
of our own labor unionists. Hence also the im- 
perative need of Christian schools of sociology for 



A CATHOLIC SOCIAL PLATFORM 357 

the training of Christian social leaders. (W. P., 
XVI, XXV.) 

WOMAN LABOR 

42. Exploitation of woman and child labor is to 
be strictly abolished, as well as every other form 
of sweating. ( W. P., XXII, XXIII, XXIV. ) 

43. While woman in industry is to receive a 
minimum wage sufficient for her own support, it 
is reasonable that she should moreover be paid 
according to her service. This will imply an 
equal wage with man for work equal in quantity 
and quality, when engaged at the same task with 
him. (W. P., XXIII.) 

44. If wife and mother are no longer driven 
to the factory, owing to the husband's inadequate 
wage, and child labor is ended, there will be work 
for the fathers of families as well as for all men 
and women who must provide their own support. 
So too a widowed mother's pension, to be paid 
as far as necessary, will keep both mother and 
children in the home. (W. P., XVII.) 

45. " Woman," says Leo XIII, " is by nature 
fitted for home-work, and it is this which is best 
adapted to her modesty and to promote the good 
up-bringing of children and the well-being of the 
family." (R. N.) " The proportion of women 
in industry ought to be kept within the smallest 
practical limits." (American Bishops.) They 
should not be placed at occupations unfit, or 



358 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

morally and physically dangerous; it is the duty 
of the State to ensure this right for them and to 
secure for them reasonable hours, sanitary condi- 
tions, abolition of night work, and the removal of 
all circumstances injurious to sex and maternity. 
{W. P., XXIV.) 

FARM LABOR 

46. Every just encouragement is to be given 
to promote farm labor and the development of a 
large class of small farm owners. (W . P., XV; 
D.I., VIII.) 

47. Cooperative buying, selling and credit as- 
sociations, and cooperative production are here to 
be particularly recommended as thoroughly ap- 
proved by experience. All abuses in transporta- 
tion, working equal hardship on the producer and 
consumer, must be removed, and produce brought 
to the market with the least intervention of middle- 
men. (JV. P., XIX, XX, VII; D. /., XIII.) 

48. Government loans should be made, where 
needed, to enable men to settle upon the land, 
either as owners or as tenants with long-time 
leases. M It is essential that both the work of 
preparation and the subsequent settlement of the 
land should be effected by groups or colonies, not 
by men living independently of one another and in 
depressing isolation. M (American Bishops.) 
Attention should be given in particular to the fa- 
cilities of regularly fulfilling religious duties. 



A CATHOLIC SOCIAL PLATFORM 359 

The problem of the farm laborer, too, is to be 
carefully studied. (JV. P., XV.) 

49. The principle of land nationalization is to 
be strongly condemned as unnatural, economically 
ruinous and undemocratic. The rights of the 
tiller to his soil must be held sacred. Keeping in- 
violate all just property rights, the laborer should 
14 be encouraged to look forward to obtaining a 
share in the land.' 5 (Leo XIII, R. N.) (JV. 
P., XVIII.) 

CAUSES OF SOCIAL DISASTER 

50. The roots of the social problem penetrate 
deep. The evils of impurity, birth control and 
divorce corrupt the individual, the home and so- 
ciety. With these are associated the inordinate 
craving after pleasure, the shirking of duty, and 
the wide-spread wastefulness and excess of all 
classes, together with a desire for the utmost gain, 
regardless of the common good. (W. P., II, 
XI; D. /., IX.) 

51. These evils, which naturally flow from a 
rejection of religion, are most intimately connected 
with all our economic and social disorders, whose 
last cause is godlessness. (W . P. } XIV.) 

52. Finally, there is the doctrine that would 
make of the State a fetish to which all human 
rights, whether of the family or of the individual, 
are to be relentlessly sacrificed. Hence follow 
State autocracy, bureaucracy, Socialism and all the 



360 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

endless forms of State paternalism that threaten 
to submerge democracy. (D. I., I, IV, XXVI, 
XXIX, etc.) 

FIRST PRINCIPLES 

53. The sacredness of all human life must be 
recognized, and the duty of conforming it to the 
Will of God. 

54. The purity of family life must be restored, 
and the family, as the unit of society, must bravely 
assume its duties and responsibilities in a true 
Christian spirit. The future belongs to those who 
safeguard the home. 

55. The pagan theory that the individual exists 
for the State and not the State for the individual, 
must be absolutely rejected. 

56. Secularization of education must be op- 
posed as the greatest danger to modern society, 
together with all over-centralization and undue 
State interference, as tending to establish the most 
pernicious of all autocracies. To the parent alone, 
and not to the State, belongs, of itself and di- 
rectly, the responsibility for the upbringing of the 

child. . 

57. The safe-guarding of the just rights of 
Christianity, on which the future of civilization 
depends, is not possible without the development 
of a strong, alert, loyal and intelligent Christian 
press. The support and furtherance of this is a 
first duty. The law, on the other hand, should be 



A CATHOLIC SOCIAL PLATFORM 36 1 

made to prevent the publication of untrue state- 
ments and reports, and protect from slander all, 
whether individually or collectively. 

58. The success of Christian Democracy, which 
is purely social and not political, will finally depend 
upon the utmost organization and concentration of 
effort. Nor should Catholics neglect the full use 
of their political rights in the measure in which 
they are granted to every citizen, since by reason 
of their Divine Faith they " may prove themselves 
capable, as much as, and even more than others, 
of cooperating in the material and civil well-being 
of the people, thus acquiring that authority and 
respect which may make it even possible for them 
to defend and promote a higher good, namely, that 
of the soul." (Pius X. " Christian Social Ac- 
tion.") 

CONCLUSION 

59. Besides the rules of social justice, the laws 
of Christian charity should bind together employer 
and employees, and all classes and ranks, into one 
Christian brotherhood. To accomplish this in its 
perfection, nothing can be of greater importance 
than that all should heed again the voice of that 
Mother from whom the nations have wandered, 
who begot them in the unity of a great Christen- 
dom in the ages of Catholic Faith. Her teach- 
ings are the same now as they were in the days 
of the Apostles, and as they will remain to the 



362 DEMOCRATIC INDUSTRY 

end of time, yet always perfectly adapted to every 
changing period of history. For the promise of 
Christ to her can never be made void: " Behold 
I am with you all days, even to the consummation 
of the world." (Matt. xxviii:20.) {W. P., 
XXV.) 

60. Hence she alone can never possibly mislead 
mankind, and there can be no surer hope for true 
and lasting reconstruction than the return of all to 
her, the one and only apostolic Church, the Church 
of our fathers. 






